Dorcas Coker-Appiah

Dorcas Ama Frema Coker-Appiah (born 17 August 1946) is a Ghanaian lawyer, women's rights activist, and the executive director of the Gender Studies and Human Rights Documentation Centre, also known as the "Gender Centre", in Accra, Ghana. She has had (and continues to have) important roles in several organisations promoting women's rights at national, regional and international levels.

Early life Coker-Appiah was born on 17 August 1946 in Wenchi, in the British colony of the Gold Coast (now Ghana). In 1970, Coker-Appiah earned a bachelor's degree in law from the University of Ghana. She was the president of FIDA's legal aid steering committee, and the project coordinator of the legal, literacy and publication committee for some years.

Coker-Appiah is a member of Women in Law and Development in Africa (WiLDAF), a Pan-African network of organizations and individuals with members in twenty-six African countries, and a founding member of WiLDAF Ghana and the chairperson of its African regional board.

Publications Breaking the Silence & Challenging the Myths of Violence Against Women and Children in Ghana: Report of a National Study on Violence (Gender Studies & Human Rights Documentation Centre, 1999, ) "Evaluation of the rural response system intervention to prevent violence against women: findings from a community-randomised controlled trial in the Central Region of Ghana" (DOI: 10.1080/16549716.2019.1711336) "Patriarchy and gender-inequitable attitudes as drivers of intimate partner violence against women in the central region of Ghana" (DOI: 10.1186/s12889-020-08825-z)