Vida Yeboah
Vida Amaadi Yeboah was a former Ghanaian educator, politician and civic leader. Deputy Minister of Education and Culture from 1988 to 1993, Yeboah helped found the Forum for African Women Educationalists in 1992. Elected member of parliament in 1992, Yeboah became a member of Jerry Rawlings' government, serving as tourism minister from 1997 to 2001.Life
Via Yeboah was born on 27 July 1944 at her maternal family village in the Eastern Region, the daughter of Kate Oye Ntow Ofosu and Eric Perigrino Nelson. She was educated at Wesley Girls High School before gaining her BA in French from the University of Ghana. She then studied for a MA in French from the University of Bordeaux in France, and a post-graduate diploma in education from the University of Cape Coast. She taught for fourteen years at girls schools in Ghana, becoming headmistress of Mfantsiman Girls' Secondary School, before being appointed a Deputy Secretary for Education in 1985.
From 1988 to 1993 Vida Yeboah was Deputy Minister of Education and Culture. Yeboah overhauled the pre-university schooling system, increasing the attendance rates for girls. In 1992 she cofounded the Forum for African Women Educationalists with four other African women ministers of education: Fay Chung in Zimbabwe, Simone Testa in the Seychelles, Paulette Moussavon-Missambo in Gabon, and Alice Tiendrebengo in Burkina Faso.
In the 1992 Ghanaian parliamentary election Yeboah was elected MP for Akwapim South, and she was re-elected with 48% of the vote in the 1996 elections. From 1993 to around 1997 she was Minister without Portfolio in the Office of the President. From 1997 to 2001 she was Minister of Tourism, a ministerial position outside the Cabinet.Awards and recognition
Vida Yeboah is remembered as one of the four founders of Forum for African Women Educationalists Ghana's Chapter.
