Michaëlle Jean

It was 27 September 2005, in Ottawa, in the Senate chamber.

A forty-eight-year-old woman was being installed as Governor General of Canada. Her name was Michaëlle Jean. For the first time, a Black person held the office.

In her speech, she said the time of the "Two Solitudes" that had for too long described the country was past.

She had chosen a motto:

Michaëlle Jean was born on 6 September 1957 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. She spent her summers and weekends in Jacmel, her mother's hometown.

Her father, Roger, ran a Protestant school. He taught philosophy there.

Haiti was then under the dictatorship of François Duvalier, known as "Papa Doc." To attend school, you had to swear allegiance to the dictator. Her parents refused. So Michaëlle learned at home.

In 1965, her father was arrested and tortured. In 1967, he fled to Canada.

The following year, Michaëlle, her mother Luce and her sister joined him. The family settled in Thetford Mines, Quebec.

Later, Michaëlle moved to Montreal with her mother and sister, into a basement apartment in Little Burgundy.

She studied Italian and Hispanic languages and literatures at the Université de Montréal. She taught Italian. She spoke five languages: French, Haitian Creole, English, Italian and Spanish.

During those years, she worked at a shelter for women who had suffered violence. She also coordinated a study on spousal abuse. That work helped create a network of shelters across Canada.

In 1986, she went back to Haiti, just as Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier was being driven from power.

In 1988, she joined Radio-Canada. She was the first Black person to appear on French-language television news in Canada. Later, she hosted documentaries on the CBC. By 2004, she had her own show, Michaëlle.

As governor general, her priorities were human rights, the arts, the Canadian North, Africa and Haiti.

In December 2008, at the request of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, she agreed to prorogue Parliament.

On 12 January 2010, the earth shook in Haiti. In Ottawa, she spoke, overcome with emotion, partly in Creole. In March, she went there herself.

She left office on 1 October 2010. That same year, she created a foundation for young people in rural, northern and disadvantaged communities.

On 8 November 2010, UNESCO named her Special Envoy for Haiti.

On 30 November 2014, the countries of La Francophonie chose her as Secretary General. She was the first woman in the post. Her term ran from January 2015 to January 2019. In 2018, at the summit in Armenia, member states chose Louise Mushikiwabo to succeed her.

Michaëlle Jean comes from Haiti, with its own traditions. Her motto echoes Ubuntu without being the same thing: we only fully exist when we step out of our solitude, toward the other.

A little girl had studied at home, so as not to swear allegiance to a dictator.

In 2005, she became Governor General of Canada.