NPP Mourns Grace Coleman

Mrs Grace Coleman

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) has described the death of its former Member of Parliament (MP) for Effiduase-Asokore, , as a major loss to the party and the nation as a whole.

It said the demise of Mrs Coleman had created a big void that would need a great effort to find a replacement, because there were very few women of such calibre in Ghana politics.

Nana Ohene Ntow, the General Secretary of the party, said Mrs Coleman died in her residence at Cantonments in Accra last Thursday.

Mrs Coleman, 66, was a Deputy Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, in the first term of the Kufuor Administration.

He added that the party was in constant touch with the family on how to offer her a befitting burial. According to a family source, she died of “stress-related” illnesses, including diabetes, which she had been battling with since 2001. She left behind her husband, Mr David Coleman, and four children.

Mrs Coleman attended Wesley Girls High School from 1962, where she obtained her Ordinary and Advanced Level certificates and continued her education at the University of Ghana, Legon, where she obtained a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics.

In 1979, young Grace did her Master’s degree at the Vanderpilt University in the United States of America, and also obtained a certificate in Leadership and Development at the Harvard University in 1998.

From 1968 to 1974, she worked with the Ghana Commercial Bank (GCB), Ejisu branch in Kumasi, where she rose to become the branch manager, and between 1975 and 1980, she was a Senior Economic Officer at the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning.

During the Limann Administration, she was Ghana’s Ambassador to the Netherlands from 1980 to 1982. A year after the overthrow of Dr Hilla Limann in 1982, she ventured into teaching, from 1983 to 1991, and became a senior lecturer at the Institute for Training in Inter Cultural Management in Holland.

She also organised consultancy for expatriate workers in Holland on the “Effects of Cultural Differences on Motivation and Management” from 1992 to 1994.

She won the parliamentary election on the ticket of the NPP in 2000 as the MP for Effiduase-Asokore till January 2009.

The family source said Mrs Coleman was a pillar in the family, and for that reason, she was referred to as “Yaa Asantewaa”, and added that her death was a big blow to the entire family.

Story : Donald Ato Dapatem