Prempeh II

Prempeh II (Otumfuo Osei Tutu Agyeman Prempeh II, – 27 May 1970), was the 14th Asantehene, or king of the Ashanti (Ruler of the Asante), reigning from 22 June 1931 to 27 May 1970.

Biography

Asantehene Prempeh II of the Ashanti was born in 1892 in the capital city called Kumasi. He was four years old when his uncle, Prempeh I (the 13th Asantehene), his maternal grandmother, Queen Nana Yaa Akyaa, and other family members were captured and exiled to the Seychelles Islands by the British in 1896. Prempeh I returned from exile in 1924 and died in May 1931, and Otumfuo Prempeh II was subsequently elected as his successor; however, he was elected as merely Kumasihene rather than Asantehene. He also gave a large tract of land for the construction of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), which in 1969 awarded him an honorary degree of Doctor of Science. In October 1969, he was elected as the first President of the National House of Chiefs, and shortly thereafter was appointed to the Council of State.