Edward Akufo-Addo
*Edward Akufo-Addo was born on this date in 1906. He was a Ghanaian politician and lawyer.
Edward Akufo-Addo was born at Dodowa in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana to William Martin Addo-Danquah and Theodora Amuafi. Both of his parents were from the southern Ghanaian town of Akropong. He had primary education at Presbyterian Primary and Middle Schools at Akropong, Presbyterian Training College, and Abetifi Theological Training College.
In 1929, he entered Achimota College, where he won a scholarship to St Peter's College, Oxford. He studied mathematics, Politics, and Philosophy, and he graduated with honors in philosophy and politics in 1933. He passed the Middle Temple Bar, London, UK, in 1940 and returned to what was then the Gold Coast to start a private legal practice in Accra. In 1947, he became a founding member of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) and was one of the "Big Six" detained after disturbances in Accra in 1948. From 1949 to 1950, he was a Gold Coast Legislative Council member and the Coussey Constitutional Commission.
From 1962–64, he was a Supreme Court Judge, one of three judges who sat on the treason trial involving the Kulungugu bomb attack on President Nkrumah and was dismissed for finding some of the accused not guilty. From 1966 to 1970, Akufo-Addo was appointed Chief Justice by the National Liberation Council (N.L.C.) regime and Chairman of the Constitutional Commission (which drafted the 1969 Second Republican Constitution). He was also head of the N.L.C. Political Commission during this same time. He used his profession to contribute to building the nation, help maintain law and order, and help establish the rule of law.
From August 1970 until his deposition by coup d'état on January 13, 1972, he was President of Ghana in the Second Republic. Real power rested with the prime minister, Dr Kofi Abrefa Busia. On July 17, 1979, Edward Akufo-Addo died of natural causes.
