‘Planting cocoa at Akuapem Mampong doesn't make Tetteh Quarshie a native’ — Family ‘schools’ Akufo-Addo

The family of Ghana's pioneering cocoa farmer Tetteh Quarshie has pushed back on claims made by President Nana Akufo-Addo about Quarshie's ancestry.

President Akufo-Addo had stated in his Independence Day speech this earlier month that Tetteh Quarshie was "an indigene of Mampong Akuapem" in the Eastern Region.

However, in a statement released on March 17, Tetteh Quarshie's family says the renowned farmer only settled there for cocoa farming after an initial failed attempt in Osu.

Michael Nii Ayi Hammond, CEO of the Tetteh Quarshie Memorial Dynasty International Secretariat and a grandson, says the president's comment "did not go down well with the Ga Dangme Council."

He added that "this statement...with others believing that it is a deliberate ploy to change the history, steal the pride and joy of Ga's and neglect the contribution of a Ga man to national development."

The family is demanding the president retract his "erroneous statement."

"We are deeply disappointed because the legacy of our father, grandfather and great grand father is rewritten and told with lots of fallacies by no means an ordinary persons rather the president of the republic," Hammond said.

They are also calling on Akufo-Addo to acknowledge his "flaws" and provide an accurate account of Quarshie's Ga ancestry from Osu.