25Year-Old Liberian Earns Masters' Degree

A 25 year-old Liberian  walked  away with a masters’ degree in finance from the Cuttington University Graduate School in Congo Town.
Zachariah Gulu Moiseemah, enrolled at the CU Graduate School in February, 2010  on Saturday, June 30, 2012, proudly walked away with a masters degree in finance.

Zachariah will be the first of his fathers’ children numbering thirty to earn a masters’ degree.

In November, 2009, he graduated with honors suma cum laude in Accounting and Economics from the African Methodist Episcopal University on Camp Johnson Road where he had only spent four years. He was one of three students in his class that graduated that year from the University with a suma cum laude.
Zachariah told the New Liberia that his academic achievement was made possible with determination, good parental guidance and Jehovah God’s blessing.
“It was not an easy journey. But with determination, courage and hard work and the support from my family I triumphed,” he said.
Zachariah started his academic journey in 1994, at age eight in the Kondembadou Refugee School in Macenta Province, Republic of Guinea.
Zachariah and his family fled to Guinea during the height of the civil war in 1993.

According to “Zac” as he is popularly called by his family and friends, during the first five months in school, he was promoted from the ABC class to the 1st grade and when the year ended he was promoted to the 2nd grade.  He said that the following year, he was again promoted during the first half of the school year to the 3rd grade and when the year ended he was promoted to the 4th grade, coming out on top of his class.
“At the end of the academic year in 1996, I was also given double promotion from the 4th grade to the 6th grade class,” he said.
According to him his life and experience in exile was marred with hard struggle.
“Life in exile for me and my family is an experience that I can hardly explain in words. It was horrible. We cut and sold wood to survive. We crushed rock to survive. We even sometimes had to go out begging people for handouts,” Zachariah narrated.

In October 1997, Zachariah and his family returned to Liberia and resettled in their home village of Gulu, situated near the Lofa River in Lofa County.
Upon returning to Liberia, Zachariah enrolled at the Tellewoyan Elementary and Junior High School in John’s Town in Zogolemai Township in 1998.
Two years later, Zachariah and his family were displaced to Monrovia by renewed fighting by the rebel group, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) fighting to depose the government of convicted Former Liberian President Charles Taylor at the time.

While here, Zachariah completed his secondary school studies from the Assemblies of God Mission School on the Old Road.
Zachariah told the New Liberia in a celebratory tone that his 94-year-old father had traveled from their village in Lofa County and is here for the celebration.
“I am happy that my old man is alive and here to celebrate my achievement with me,” he said
A magistrate in Zogolemai Township, Zacharia’s father oldman Rufus K. Moiseemah told the New Liberia that he was impressed by the achievement of his son.
“Zac is a genius. He’s a brain among men of his generation.

“Zac is the first among my children to obtain such high university degree and I am very proud of him,” the 94-year-old said.
Zachariah whose 26 birth day is a few months away says he has plans to pursue another degree, this time in law.