University of Ghana should be renamed after my father – Busia’s daughter

A daughter of Ghana’s former Prime Minister, Kofi Abrefa Busia, Nana Fremah Busia wants the University of Ghana to be renamed after her father.

She said the University of Ghana should have been renamed after her father by now, given his contribution to tertiary education.

Some public universities have been earmarked to be renamed after some key personalities who played diverse roles in Ghana’s development.

The decision has generated mixed reactions from members of the general public with many asking the government to focus on improving public education instead.

One of them is former President Rawlings who has turned down the honour of having the University of Development Studies named after him.

But speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show today on the legacy of her father, Nana Fremah Busia said naming the country’s premier university after her father would be justified.

“There is a university that should have been named after him, it is called the University of Ghana, Legon. He was the first African professor there. He established the sociology department; he incorporated the African studies department in sociology, Today when you go to Legon, there is an African studies department named after Dr. Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah, who the University of Science and Technology is named after,” she said.

“Kofi Abrefa Busia was the first African professor at Oxford University, at a time when most people had not seen classrooms, so are we going to honour him now with some universities that do not have gravitas? What about Legon. The African studies department for a very long time had the head of the department, Dr. Bami, who is Dr. Busia’s brother. But for politics, he would have been the first vice chancellor of the university,” she said.

Frema Busia also decried what she describes as a failure of successive governments to follow the development path her father set for Ghana.

In May 2018, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo stated categorically that his uncle, Joseph Kwame Kyeretwie Boakye Danquah, a pan-Africanist and a member of the big six, is the founder of Ghana’s premier university, the University of Ghana.

According to him, it was through the inspirational vision of JB Danquah, that Ghanaians were able to reject the original decision of the colonial government to agree to establish a separate university for Ghana.

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By: Farida Yusif | citinewsroom.com | Ghana