No country can move ahead, develop and join the comity of respected nations without an illiterate population. And the truism is that education is not possible without one being able to read and write.It is no wonder that Mrs Rebecca Akufo-Addo, whose husband President Nana Akufo-Addo has put into place the free senior high school policy to ensure that young Ghanaian boys and girls have at least senior high school education is very passionate about reading and writing. Not only is reading one of her hobbies, she has set under the Rebecca Foundation the “Learning to read, reading to learn” project to extend the much needed basics of education to deprived areas of the country. To ensure the success of the project not only does the Foundation intend to build libraries across the country - it has even started the libraries project , it has been airing a weekly reading programme on television.
According to her, research shows that many Ghanaian school children lacked reading and writing skills not only in English language but in Ghanaian languages as well, making them not able to understand what they are being taught for self-improvement application. Aside this project, the Rebecca Foundation is seriously involved in a multiplicity of programmes meant to augment the efforts of government to improve the wellbeing of Ghanaian citizens. A glance at the website of the Foundation which has Mrs Rebecca Akufo-Addo as the Executive Director shows that since its inception in 2017, the Foundation has spearheaded the construction of a new mother and baby unit at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Kumasi, assisted the schools for special needs children in Akwapim, supported various children from across the country to undergo urgent medical interventions and has also resourced many orphanages in the country.
It has also funded the construction of a community bridge in Zenu – a low income highly populated community in the Greater Accra Region, and the renovation of a community clinic in Abamkrom in the Central Region. Additionally, The Rebecca Foundation has trained about 200 women in the Eastern and Northern regions of Ghana in bead making, batik making and entrepreneurship. The foundation is also helping to improve learning outcomes for Ghanaian children.
She is very supportive of her husband, Nana Akufo-Addo, by deeply involving herself through her Foundation in moving the country forward in the right direction but who really is Mrs Rebecca Akufo-Addo?
She was born 69 years ago, precisely March 12, 1951 to Justice Jacob Hackenburg Griffiths- Randolph and Mrs Frances Phillipina Griffiths-Randolph. Her father was the Speaker of Parliament in Ghana’s Third Republic. Though from Ningo was born at Osu. She is the third born of seven siblings.
After passing through Achimota Primary School and Wesley Grammar School in Accra she trained as a secretary at the Government Secretarial School. Having worked for sometime at the Merchant Bank of Ghana she travelled to the United Kingdom where she trained as a legal secretary. Having qualified as a legal secretay she worked at Clifford Chance and Ashurst Morriss Crisp – reputable multinational law firms. Watchers at the State House say though Mrs Akufo-Addo, fondly called Auntie Becky, has not been long at the office of the First Lady her achievements in the lives of women and children compare only to those of Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, the wife of the first president of the Fourth Republic.
Many agree to this assessment taking into consideration the tireless welfare interventions of the Rebecca Foundation complementing the efforts of government; supporting and promoting initiatives that improve the economic status of women; enhancing literacy and learning skills in children; improving environmental health and sanitation by greening public spaces.
