<P> In 2001, the government again planned to take public forest land and give it to its supporters . While protesting this and collecting petition signatures on 7 March 2001, in Wang'uru village near Mount Kenya, Maathai was again arrested . The following day, following international and popular protest at her arrest, she was released without being charged . On 7 July 2001, shortly after planting trees at Freedom Corner in Uhuru Park in Nairobi to commemorate Saba Saba Day, Maathai was again arrested . Later that evening, she was again released without being charged . In January 2002, Maathai returned to teaching as the Dorothy McCluskey Visiting Fellow for Conservation at the Yale University's School of Forestry and Environmental Studies . She remained there until June 2002, teaching a course on sustainable development focused on the work of the Green Belt Movement . </P> <P> Upon her return to Kenya, Maathai again campaigned for parliament in the 2002 elections, this time as a candidate of the National Rainbow Coalition, the umbrella organization which finally united the opposition . On 27 December 2002, the Rainbow Coalition defeated the ruling party Kenya African National Union, and in Tetu Constituency Maathai won with an overwhelming 98% of the vote . In January 2003, she was appointed Assistant Minister in the Ministry for Environment and Natural Resources and served in that capacity until November 2005 . She founded the Mazingira Green Party of Kenya in 2003 to allow candidates to run on a platform of conservation as embodied by the Green Belt Movement . It is a member of the Federation of Green Parties of Africa and the Global Greens . </P> <P> Wangarĩ Maathai was awarded the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize for her "contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace". She had received a call from Ole Danbolt Mjos, chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, on 8 October informing her of the news . She became the first African woman, and the first environmentalist, to win the prize . </P> <P> Wangarĩ Muta Maathai--Unbowed, p. 291 - 292 . </P>

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