Annie Ruth Jiagge

Annie Ruth Jiagge, (née Baëta; 7 October 1918 – 12 June 1996), also known as Annie Baëta Jiagge, was a Ghanaian lawyer, judge and women's rights activist. She was the first woman in Ghana and the Commonwealth of Nations to become a judge. and was instrumental in the establishment of the University of Ghana, Legon in 1948. Her parents wanted her to have an English education so she lived in the coastal town of Keta (then in British Togoland) with her maternal grandmother.

Baeta attended Achimota College and earned her teacher's certificate in 1937. She was headmistress and teacher at the Evangelical Presbyterian Girls School from 1940 to 1946. After the buildings of the Evangelical Presbyterian School for Girls were washed away by the ocean in 1940, the girls were moved to the Evangelical Presbyterian School for Boys. The school was overcrowded, and Baeta knew it would be difficult to find funding for new buildings. She approached the Evangelical Presbyterian Church Choir and transformed it into a drama group that put on the George F. Rool musical David the Shepherd Boy. The performances were successful and the group was invited to perform in major Gold Coast cities and in Togo. Baeta was able to raise funds for a new school for the girls that was built by December 1945. Her elder brother Christian made inquiries to the University of London on her behalf and her mother secured loans for her. She was admitted to the London School of Economics and Political Science in 1946. Her male colleagues from the Gold Coast urged her to abandon her studies, thinking them too difficult for a woman. One offered to arrange a position for her at the Paris Academy to study dress design. She told them she would return to the Gold Coast if she didn't pass her first examination. She passed, and was no longer bothered by the men. She received her LLB in 1949 and was called to the Bar at Lincoln's Inn the following year. Baëta also participated in religious and social work during her free time in London. She worked with youth camps organised by the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) and was elected to the Executive Committee of the World YWCA during her final years as a student. From 1955 to 1960, she was president of the YWCA. She and her husband adopted a child, Rheinhold, in 1959. In 1959, she became a judge for the Circuit Court. She was awarded an honorary law degree from the University of Ghana in 1974. In 1975, she founded the Ghana National Council on Women and Development and was its first chair. As chair, she convened a meeting of Ghanaian women to learn their views on Equality, Development and Peace, the theme of the 1975 International Women's Conference in Mexico. She learned that access to credit was a priority for her country's women and led Ghana's delegation to the conference. She and others pledged seed money for a women's bank, and the organisation Stitching to Promote Women's World Banking (now Women's World Banking) was founded and headquartered in New York. She later served on the board of Women's World Banking in Ghana. Jiagge also served as a president of the World Council of Churches from 1975 to 1983. In 1979, she was a member of the constituent assembly which wrote the constitution of the Ghana's Third Republic. She was the World Council of Churches' moderator for their Programme to Combat Racism from 1984 to 1991 and mobilised against South Africa's system of apartheid. A boarding house, the Annie Baëta Jiagge House, formerly, House 17, at her alma mater, Achimota School was named in her memory in recognition of her role as a trailblazer in the legal profession in Ghana.

Awards The Grand Medal of Ghana (1969) The Gimbles International Award (1969)