Sweden's equality minister Nyamko Ana Sabuni announced Monday that she's stepping down from the post and at the same time giving up her seat in the parliament.

"I decided long ago that I wouldn't run for the Riksdag in the 2014 election, and have therefore realized that I should give a successor enough time to get into the job in good time for the election," Nyamko Sabuni wrote in a statement posted on Monday, according to the TT news agency.

Nyamko Ana Sabuni -- member of the Liberal People's Party -- has served as Minister for Gender Equality and Minister for Integration in the Swedish center-right government from 2006.

She was born in Bujumbura in Burundi where her father, a left-wing politician from Zaire, lived in exile.

Sabuni's father is a Christian while her mother is a Muslim. She has described herself as non-religious.