Women have been versatile

Daily Graphic, Spread. (Ghana at 52 special), Thursday, March 05/09

Story: Rebecca Quaicoe-Duho

SINCE independence, many women have played different roles through their political, economic and educational endeavours to help lift high the image of their beloved country.
The contribution of women to Ghana’s politics after independence is significant, as it has helped to pave the way for more women to be elected into Parliament. The need to have more women represented in the Parliament of the First Republic led to the introduction of the Representation of the People’s (Women Members) Bill which was passed in 1960.
Through that act, 10 women were elected unopposed as Members of Parliament (MPs) in June 1960. Three of them, Susanna Al-Hassan, Ayanori Bukari and Victoria Nyarko, represented the Northern Region; two others, Sophia Doku and Mary Koranteng, represented the Eastern Region, while Regina Asamany was the Volta Regional representative.
The rest were Grace Ayensu and Christiana Wilmot, Western Region; Comfort Asamoah, Ashanti Region, and Lucy Anim, Brong Ahafo.
In 1965, Madam Al-Hassan was appointed as the Minister of Social Welfare and Community Development by Ghana’s First President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, while others were appointed as district commissioners.
In the Second Republic, there were two women MPs — Madam Akanbodiipo Lydia Azure, who stood on the ticket of the National Alliance of Liberals (NAL) and won the Sandema seat, and Madam Tedam Catherine, who won the Chiana-Paga seat for the Progress Party (PP).
In the Third Republic, five women served as MPs, and in the First Parliament of the Fourth Republic 16 women were elected as MPs, while in 1997 there were 18 women elected to Parliament.
In 2001, 19 women went to the Third Parliament of the Fourth Republic, while in 2005, 25 were elected to Parliament.
Presently, 20 women are in the Fifth Parliament of the Fourth Republic and many more women are occupying key positions in the Executive, Judiciary and Legislature.
There is the first female Speaker of Parliament, Mrs Joyce Adeline Bamford-Addo, who is a retired Supreme Court judge. There is also the Chief Justice, Mrs Justice Georgina Theodora Wood, who was sworn into office in June 2007 as the 24th Chief Justice of the country and the first woman in the history of Ghana to head the Judiciary.
A woman is also heading the Ghana Police Service (GPS) for the first time. Mrs Elizabeth Mills-Robertson is the acting Inspector-General of Police (IGP). Before her appointment, she was a Deputy IGP in charge of Administration.
One other versatile woman is the Director of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS), Ms Elizabeth Adjei. She was appointed to that office in September 2002 and she is the first female in Ghana to head the GIS.
She is responsible for determining the strategic direction and policy of the service and managing the development of the GIS in accordance with legal and international requirements.
Ms Anna Bossman is the acting Commissioner of the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ). One other woman who is making Ghanaian women proud is Dr Grace Bediako who, since July 2004, has been the Government Statistician. Prior to her appointment, she was Chief of the Demographic Statistics Division of the United Nations.
On the educational front, many women have achieved higher laurels through hard work. One such woman is Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast and first female vice-chancellor of a state university in the country. She assumed duty on October 1, 2008, succeeding Reverend Professor Emmanuel Addow-Obeng whose tenure as vice-chancellor ended on that same date.
She started life as a lecturer in the English Department of the UCC in 1986.
There is also the First Vice-President of the International Criminal Court, Judge Akua Kuenyehia. She was one time Dean of the Faculty of Law of the University of Ghana.
Another personality is Mrs Henrietta Mensa-Bonsu. She is the UN Deputy Special Representative (Rule of Law) for Liberia. Her appointment was announced by the UN Secretary General on August 22, 2007. She was a professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Ghana.
Professor Florence Abena Dolphyne rose through the ranks to become the first Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, a record which is yet to be broken.
On the economic front, many women are in industry and production and this has helped to boost the economy of the country.
Ms Joyce R. Aryee is the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Chamber of Mines. She is the first woman to head the Ghanaian chamber and also the first woman to hold that position in Africa.
Another woman who will forever be remembered for her role in promoting women’s entrepreneurship is Dr (Mrs) Esther Afua Ocloo, the owner of Nkulenu Industries and pioneer in micro loans for women. She was one of Ghana's leading entrepreneurs and prominent exponent of the role of women in economic development and helped to establish the Women’s World Banking. She died in 2002 at age 83.
Another woman industrialist is Mrs Elizabeth Joyce Villars, founder of CAMELOT, a security printing, business forms manufacturing and design facility based in Accra and listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange. She is the first qualified Ghanaian female computer programmer and is a systems analyst by profession. She worked as the Head of the Computer Department at the Volta River Authority and as a systems consultant with the West African Data Services Bureau Limited (WADSB). She is a past president of the Governing Council of the Private Enterprises Foundation (PEF) and also past President of the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI).
There is also Mrs Sylvia M. Boye, who was once Chairman of the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund). Before that appointment she had worked with the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) and risen through the ranks to retire as the Registrar.
Another woman is Reverend Ama Afo Blay, who retired as the Director-General of the Ghana Education Service. She is currently a reverend minister with the Methodist Church of Ghana.
These achievements and many more which have not been recorded in history books have firmly placed Ghana at the forefront of efforts to see women rise to prominence in Africa and the world.