Catherine Ablema Afeku

Catherine Ablema Afeku (born June 27, 1967) is a Ghanaian politician. She is a member of the New Patriotic Party and the Member of Parliament for the Evalue Gwira Constituency in the Western Region. She was a cabinet minister in the Nana Akuffo-Addo administration and served as the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts of Ghana from February 2017 to February 2019.

She was reshuffled from the Ministry of Tourism to the Presidency of the Republic of Ghana on 28 February 2019. She is currently a Minister of State at the Office of the President, assigned to the Office of the Senior Minister.

Early life and education She was born at Axim and attended Nsein Senior High School, now Kwame Nkrumah Senior High School, Axim in the Western Region. She obtained a Master of Business Administration from the Keller Graduate School of Management of DeVry University in Atlanta, Georgia in the year 2000.

Working life Afeku has worked with the World Bank and Stico Petroleum in Kenya, where she served as a business development consultant. In the early 2000s she became a Government of Ghana spokesperson for infrastructure in the John Agyekum Kufour administration.

Afeku was appointed Chairperson of the Leadership Taskforce of the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). This was announced on 25 January 2018.

Vetting controversy Prior to being vetted by the Parliamentary Appointment Committee, reports emerged that Catherine and her husband were defendants in a civil case of breach of contract in 2007. The reports showed that the Afekus had been directed by an Accra High Court to pay $217,464.00 plus 50% interest to an American couple, Patricia and Bill Gick, after charges of fraud had been brought against them. Catherine and her husband had failed to honour the instructions of the court. A pressure group calling itself Truth and Accountable Governance petitioned President Akuffo-Addo to remove her from her ministerial position. When probed by the committee, Afeku made it known that payment had not been made because an appeal filed in 2013 was yet to be heard; hence, she could not preempt judgement. During the vetting process, members of the minority argued that approval should not be given because she had not done the one-year mandatory National Service. Her nomination was approved on 11 February 2017 after she presented the Appointments Committee with a waiver letter given her by the National Service Secretariat. The approval was by consensus.

Personal life Catherine is married to Seth Afeku with whom she has three children. She is a Christian and a member of the Catholic Church, Ghana.