Former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, Emeritus Professor Ernest Aryeetey, has shared a reflective assessment of General Ignatius Kutu Acheampong, Ghana’s Head of State from 1972 to 1978.
Prof. Aryeetey has described Acheampong as a leader whose intentions were noble but whose policies missed the mark.
Speaking on Accra-based Channel One TV, Professor Aryeetey said Acheampong was “well-intentioned, well-meaning, but basically didn’t get his policies right.”
He observed that public discourse around Acheampong often focuses on labeling him as either a good or bad leader, a view he finds too simplistic.
“I see a struggle between whether he was a good man or a bad man. But that is not how I look at it,” Aryeetey remarked. “He could have been a very good man who simply made mistakes, as most of us do all the time.”
While acknowledging that Acheampong’s style of governance “left a lot to be desired,” Professor Aryeetey nonetheless noted that “he said the right things, he knew how to provide for the well-being of people.”
General I.K. Acheampong, along with Generals Akwasi Amankwaa Afrifa and Frederick William Kwasi Akuffo, and five senior military officers, Amedume, Boakye, Felli, Kotei, and Utuka, were executed by firing squad on June 16, 1979.
Source: Adomonline
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