Information Globaltipsgh.com has chanced upon indicates that the former
President of Ghana died of COVID-19.
Our source says the founder of the National
Democratic Congress (NDC ) was admitted at the Cardiothoracic Center at Korle
Bu in Accra a week ago but died on Thursday morning.
Former President of Ghana recently buried his mother
Madam Victoria Agbotui in October 2020.
COVID-19 on
the rise in Ghana with current numbers at 1, 469.
About Jerry John Rawlings
Jerry John
Rawlings was born June 22, 1947.
He was a
former military leader and subsequent politician who ruled Ghana from 1981 to
2001 and also a brief period in 1979.
He led a
military junta until 1992, and then served two terms as the democratically
elected President of Ghana.
Rawlings initially came to power in Ghana as a flight
lieutenant of the Ghana Air Force following a coup d’état in 1979.
Prior to that,
he led an unsuccessful coup attempt against the ruling military government on
15 May 1979, just five weeks before scheduled democratic elections were due to
take place.
After
initially handing power over to a civilian government, he took back control of
the country on 31 December 1981 as the Chairman of the Provisional National
Defence Council (PNDC).
In 1992,
Rawlings resigned from the military, founded the National Democratic Congress
(NDC), and became the first President of the Fourth Republic. He was re-elected
in 1996 for four more years.
After two
terms in office, the limit according to the Ghanaian Constitution, Rawlings
endorsed his Vice-President John Atta Mills as presidential candidate in 2000.
Education and military career
Rawlings
finished his secondary education at Achimota College in 1967.
He joined the
Ghana Air Force shortly afterwards.
In March 1968,
he was posted to Takoradi, in Ghana’s Western Region, to continue his studies.
He graduated
in January 1969, and was commissioned as a Pilot Officer, winning the coveted
“Speed Bird Trophy” as the best cadet in flying the Su-7 ground attack
supersonic jet aircraft as he was skilled in aerobatics.
He earned the
rank of Flight Lieutenant and in April 1978.
During his
service with the Ghana Air Force, Rawlings perceived a deterioration in
discipline and morale due to corruption in the Supreme Military Council (SMC).
As promotion
brought him into contact with the privileged classes and their social values,
his view of the injustices in society hardened.
He was thus
regarded with some unease by the SMC.
After the 1979
coup, he involved himself with the student community of the University of
Ghana, where he developed a more leftist ideology through reading and discussion
of social and political ideas.
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