Rose Akua Ampofo

Rose Akua Ampofo (8 May 1948 – 14 March 2003) was a Ghanaian educator and gender advocate who became the first woman in Ghana to be ordained a Presbyterian minister. Between 1992 and 2002, she was the founding Director of the Presbyterian Women's Training Centre (PWTC) at Abokobi.

Early life and education Rose Akua Ampofo was born on 8 May 1948 at Asikam in the then Eastern Province of the Gold Coast. She had a difficult childhood and was raised by a foster family in Kyebi, also in the Eastern Region. She was later appointed the General Secretary of the Presbyterian Women's Fellowship and helped shape the women's ministry and mobilise seed funding through local meetings for the eventual establishment of the PWTC. Other sources of funding came from Presbyterian churches and groups in New York and Southern Germany.

She often remarked in the Twi language, “Onipa yɛ mɔbɔ,” meaning “Human beings deserve sympathy.”

In her role as the Director of the PWTC, she provided technical, material and informational resources to train women for gender-oriented development in leadership, communication, business and finance. In partnership with local and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as the EZE, she organised women's workshops on healthy living, sustainable development and the environment and on the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Ampofo's leadership also embodied Christian womanhood, emphasising the increasing role women from the Global South play in shaping Christianity for economic development.

Literature

Rose Akua Ampofo, "The Role of Religious Organisations in Developing Women’s Capacity: A Case of the Presbyterian Women’s Centre," in Florence Abena Dolphyne and Esther Ofei-Aboagye, Experiences in Capacity Building for Ghanaian Women, Accra: Asempa Publishers, 2001, 90-107 Rose Akua Ampofo (RAA) Memorial Lectures, Volume 1, Accra: Asempa Publishers, 2019