Jeanne Gervais

Jeanne Gervais, née Jeanne Ahou Siefer-N’Dri (June 6, 1922 – December 9, 2012) was an Ivorian politician and the first woman minister in Côte d'Ivoire. She became married to Marc Gervais, also born to a French father. Marc had a similar background in terms of education, and worked as an entrepreneur in the construction sector. Jeanne and Marc Gervais had seven children: André, Marie Dominique, Liliane, Nicole, Claudine, Georges, and Chantal.

A longtime member of the Democratic Party of Côte d'Ivoire – African Democratic Rally, she participated in the women's march in her hometown in 1949. Trained as a teacher at the École normal de Rufisque, she became one of three women, alongside Hortense Aka-Anghui and Gladys Anoma, elected to the National Assembly immediately after independence. She served in that body from 1965 until 1980. , remaining in that role until 1984 and becoming the first woman to serve in the Ivorian cabinet. later described her approach as a pragmatic “feminism without excess”; Gervais herself criticized what she viewed as the “excesses” of European and North American feminisms and called instead for a balance between men and women.