72-year-old Dame Sandra Mason has been elected as Barbados first ever president as the country prepares to remove the Queen as head of state and become a republic.
(Barbados Nation) Members of the House of Assembly and the Senate in a separate ballot, voted Governor General Dame Sandra Mason to be Barbados’ first President on November 30, 2021.
The election of Dame Sandra will officially end the tenure of Queen Elizabeth II as head of state of Barbados and November 30, traditionally Independence Day, will also be Republic Day in Barbados.
Dame Sandra Mason was a practising Attorney-at-Law who has served as a High Court judge in Saint Lucia and a Court of Appeal judge in Barbados. She was the first woman admitted to the Bar in Barbados. She served as chair of the CARICOM commission to evaluate regional integration, was the first magistrate appointed as an Ambassador from Barbados, and was the first woman to serve on the Barbados Court of Appeals. She was also the first Bajan appointee to the Commonwealth Secretariat Arbitral Tribunal.
Mason has been called one of the 10 most powerful women in Barbados. In 2017, she was appointed as the 8th Governor General of Barbados, with a term beginning on 8 January 2018. Simultaneously with her appointment, Mason was awarded the Dame Grand Cross in the Order of Saint Michael and Saint George. On assumption of the office of Governor-General, Dame Sandra Mason, became the Chancellor of the Order of National Heroes, Order of Barbados and the Order of Freedom.
