Raja Nicola

Raja Nicola Eissa Abdel-Masih is a member of the Sovereignty Council of Sudan, the country's collective transitional head of state, since 21 August 2019. She was chosen for this position as one of six civilians to hold seats in the 11-member council. She was the only one of them whose name was agreed upon through a consensus between the Forces of Freedom and Change alliance (FFC) and the Transitional Military Council (TMC), as was foreseen under the terms of the Draft Constitutional Declaration of August 2019. As such she is, along with fellow council member Aisha Musa el-Said, one of the first two women in modern Sudanese history to hold the role of a head of state and is also the first Christian to hold such a high political office in the country.