President John Dramani Mahama declared his confidence that Ghana will witness its first female president in the near future, addressing world leaders at the Global Leaders' Meeting on Women in Beijing on Monday.
Speaking before dignitaries including Chinese President Xi Jinping and dozens of heads of state, Mahama emphasized that Ghana's progress toward empowering women represents more than symbolic gestures. "These are not symbolic gestures; they are a deliberate affirmation that women deserve a seat at the highest levels of decision-making," he stated, earning applause from the assembled leaders.
The two-day summit, co-hosted by China and UN Women, marks the 30th anniversary of the landmark 1995 Beijing Declaration on women's rights and seeks to accelerate its implementation. Ghana's president attended in his capacity as an African Union champion for women's empowerment, bringing First Lady Lordina Dramani Mahama alongside him.
Mahama pointed to education as the foundation of Ghana's gender equality efforts. "We've achieved gender parity in school enrollment. Girls are going to school and staying in school," he said, though the reality proves more nuanced than his declaration suggests. While Ghana has indeed reached near-complete gender parity in primary and secondary enrollment, significant gaps remain, particularly at senior high school level where only 68 girls complete for every 100 boys.
The president outlined concrete policy measures his administration has implemented or plans to introduce. Most notably, he announced that the Affirmative Action Bill mandates a minimum of 30% female representation in public appointments by the end of 2026, rising to 35% by 2028 and reaching 50% by 2030. It's an ambitious timeline that will require sustained political will beyond his current term.
Mahama also revealed plans to establish a Women's Development Bank aimed at enhancing women's economic participation, addressing one of the persistent barriers that keep women from reaching their full potential. Access to capital has long been identified as a critical obstacle for female entrepreneurs in Ghana.
"Our commitment is further demonstrated by robust institutional reforms and legal frameworks that are designed to protect the rights of women and girls," Mahama stated, highlighting programs including the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) initiative, which specifically targets female-headed households, and the Ghana School Feeding Programme.
His optimistic prediction about a female president came with characteristic confidence. "I am confident that, in the very near future, our women will break the glass ceiling and that a woman will be president of the Republic of Ghana," he declared.
Whether that confidence is justified depends on whom you ask. Ghana has made strides that deserve recognition; secondary school enrollment hit 91.07% in the 2023/2024 academic year, with girls' participation reaching 93%, driven largely by the Free SHS policy. But enrollment numbers don't tell the whole story about women's political empowerment or their path to the presidency.
Ghana's political landscape remains overwhelmingly male-dominated. Parliament has struggled to achieve even modest female representation, and the country's major political parties have yet to seriously consider a female presidential candidate. Cultural attitudes about women in leadership positions, while slowly evolving, remain a significant barrier.
The president's declaration also highlights an interesting tension in Ghanaian politics. Mahama himself has been a vocal advocate for gender equality throughout his political career, yet his own party, the National Democratic Congress, hasn't nominated a woman for the top position. Neither has the opposition New Patriotic Party. So when exactly is this "very near future" supposed to arrive?
That said, dismissing Mahama's statement as mere rhetoric misses the point. Public declarations by sitting presidents matter. They shift expectations, create political pressure, and signal to young women that leadership at the highest level is achievable. Whether Ghana's first female president emerges in five years, ten years, or longer, statements like these help create the conditions that make it possible.
The Global Leaders' Meeting on Women represents the kind of international platform where commitments get made. The question, as always, is whether those commitments translate into concrete action once leaders return home. Ghana has the policies on paper; the challenge lies in implementation and in confronting the deeper cultural and structural barriers that keep women from political power.
For now, Mahama's prediction stands as both an aspiration and a challenge to Ghana's political establishment. If a female president does emerge in the near future, it'll be because of sustained effort to create pathways to leadership, not because someone predicted it at a conference in Beijing. But predictions can become self-fulfilling prophecies when they're backed by genuine commitment to change.