Accra, Ghana, October 22, 2020//-The numerous achievements chalked by Dr Abena Asomaning Antwi in business and management consulting, entrepreneurship, corporate governance, and advocacy are yet to be fully-appreciated publicly in Ghana.
But her stellar success story has been hailed globally with awards and panegyrics. She is a health economist, and a human rights activist par excellence of no mean measure and imbibed with a heart of gold towards humanitarian causes.
The advice, expertise, experience and wisdom of this achiever can hardly be overlooked after a few moments in her presence and all these assets are being sought locally and internationally.
For her immeasurable and unique achievements, Dr Aby, as fondly called by many, has been recognized locally and internationally with several awards.
On 1st of April, 2019, she was celebrated among some phenomenal women on the African continent by the French President, Emmanuel Macron under the Conseil Présidentiel pour l’Afrique (CPA) which was established in 2017.
The CPA designed a program to celebrate some women in Africa contributing to development in different fields. Under the ‘Campagne#UnJourUneFemme’ which commenced on 8th March 2019, Dr Abena A. Antwi was celebrated among other African women such as Marietou Mbaye (Senegal), Nigest Haile (Ethiopia), Lucia Bakulumpagi-Wamala (Uganda), Ifeoma Fafunwa (Nigeria), Habiba Ghribi (Tunisia), just to mention a few.
In 2018, at a private ceremony at the residence of the British High Commissioner, H.E. Iain Walker, a presentation of a distinguished award was made to the affable humanitarian, on behalf of the Queen of England, Her Royal Majesty, under the Points of Light award making her the 62nd personality around the world to receive such.
This was in recognition of her continued commitment to the Ghanaian community through her charity, the Angel-Zoe Foundation. Dr Antwi has also won awards such as the MTN Heroes of Change Award 2013 (Advocacy), National Young Achievers’ Award (2012), Glitz Women of the Year Awards (2016).
She is currently a nominee for the Young Professional Role Model Award under the Young Professionals and Youth Coalition.
Despite these awards, Dr Aby does not seem to be inundated as she further discusses, excitedly her plans to undertake further community development projects.
Her journey
Dr Antwi who holds a PhD from the University of Lille in France, specialized in Health Economics, has recently joined the University of Professional Studies, Accra (UPSA) where she hopes to impact the academic community as a policy entrepreneur and a “pracademic” – bridging the exciting gap between industry and academia.
When African Eye Report caught up with her in Accra, and on her humanitarian career path she said passionately, “What I chose to do was considered unconventional at the time – defying unthinkable odds of moving from the banking sector to set up my own NGO in 2007 called Angel-Zoe Foundation which cares for the needs of abused children, juveniles and women in prison on a whim”.
In her estimation, there was a vacuum in that area with nobody doing much to address the issues therein. After a while in there, she initially concluded that her skills set and passion would be much better used in the civil society space where she could truly undertake advocacy on human rights and other related projects.
In her words: “Not a lot of people were interested in that space. Still, there aren’t a lot of people in that space because it is not considered glamorous and rewarding. Unlike working in the orphanages and other sub-sectors, this one is a very unique area”.
One of the funding obstacles faced by her NGO is the fact that many people have the perception that prison inmates commit offences and/or harm people to get in there, so there is no desire to render support.
As a remedy she elucidates, “When I set up the charity, I wasn’t getting funding and thought since I have work experience, why don’t I offer consultancy services to organizations to make some money for my charity work?”
Some of the consultancy assignments undertaken by Dr Antwi have been multifaceted and mulitsectoral, spanninggovernment ministries, the banking, insurance, civil society, among others.
Through these experiences she has had better views of activities in the health sector and other sectors of the Ghanaian economy and remains committed to contribute to the development of her country.
Notable Activities of Angel-Zoe Foundation
Through the Foundation, she has built the capacity of some prison officers. “Some of the things we have done with the prisons have been training the juveniles because the prison has what they call workshops.
When juveniles enter the prison, they would essentially give them a trade or a vocation.For instance, they would put them into carpentry or tailoring workshops and others”.
But when I started working with them I realized that after giving them those skills that was the end but there needed to be some complementary and soft skills to complete the eventual use of the vocational training”.
Dr Antwi believes that in the real world, the ex-offenders have to learn how to market their products and services which require knowledge in financial management, packaging, communications and branding and all of these parts which form part of business administration, could easily be overlooked.
She therefore started offering training to the prison inmates in these areas. Dr Antwi additionally realized that a lot of the young offenders came from broken homes where aspirational figures were missing and thus, needed mentors and coaches to help them with their journeys. She added that aspect to her work.
She has worked with the Osu Shelter for Abused Children and also, the Nsawam Female Medium Security Prison in capacity-building and provision of food and medical assistance.
Her charity has set up an ICT training centre and library at the Senior Correctional Centre formerly known as Borstal Institute at Roman Ridge, a suburb of Accra.
During the 10th anniversary of the Angel-Zoe Foundation in 2017, she rehabilitated a dormitory block and furnished it and this came at the heels of the overcrowding problem that existed in the dormitory ceils which threatened an outbreak of skin diseases, Dr Antwi revealed.
After over a decade of working exclusively with the Ghana Prison Service and the Social Welfare department, she observed that some of the recurring challenges are institutional, and not necessarily in the domain of the Ghana Prison Service alone.
She asserted that because the justice delivery system is a continuum which has its value chain embroiled in many other institutions, the role of all stakeholders was critical. Thus the Police make arrests, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) under the Police Service does the investigations and puts the wards or convicts in remand or take them to court. They only get to the prison service when they are sentenced.
Now after the prison term, what next? When they step out, the social welfare department is supposed to support them but the social welfare system in the country is broken down with no visible support for ex-convicts.
To initiate the very-needed conversation among the different but related stakeholders, Dr Abena Antwi designed a project called ‘The Justice Delivery Dialogues” for the Ghana Police Service, the Judicial Service, Ghana Prison Service and officials from the Social Welfare Department.
Boards
Dr Abena Asomaning Antwi who is also a product of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), has served on its governing council.
She is currently a member of the council of the University of Education, Winneba and also serves on a number of other boards including Blue Skies Foundation and GRATIS Foundation, the latter on which she has served since 2013.
Dr Antwi is a Trustee of the Head of State Awards Scheme (a charity responsible for the non-formal education of the youth in Ghana and an affiliate of the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award, UK).
She has additionally served on the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH) (United Kingdom). She was a board member of the Research and Advisory Group which makes decisions on content, criteria for funding and strategic direction for this research and funding institution focused on health and safety at the workplace. It has over 47, 000 members across 130 countries.
Going global and regional
She confirmed to African Eye Report during the interview that she wants to explore work opportunities on the international market particularly the African region.
Dr Antwi believes that there is so much to be done for this continent and her vast experience can be used in bringing about positive change.
The human rights advocate is a member of the Women of Africa Network, an NGO which has a pool of professional women of African descent from all over the world and with an interest in contributing to the implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCTA), the newest free trade area.
She talks about the AfCTA saying, “The AfCTA is exciting and represents renewed hope for Africa. What this means for me and why I’m happy about it is that it gives us a lot of opportunities to get involved in the development of our continent particularly in the area of trade.
If the AfCTA is done well, it would do away with the challenges of trade on the African continent’s economic development. For instance, it would knock off the fragmentation of African markets and improve the negotiation powers of African countries”, she explained. She has interest in access to healthcare for members of the AfCTA.
Dr Aby is a fun-loving person but somewhat conservative. Having published two books, book chapters, and journals, one of which was presented at the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) 6th Conference On Regulating For Decent Work And Well-Being In the 21st Century, she is also a public speaker who is well-known at several women’s conferences.
She paints as a hobby. And with a coy smile, calls herself a hopeless romantic who expresses herself through poetry, some of which can be enjoyed on her social media handles.
By Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh, African Eye Report
