Brigadier Joseph Nunoo-Mensah (born 14 February 1939) is a

Ghanaian Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in Ghana–Ivory Coast border, the west, Burkina ...

soldier A soldier is a person who is a member of an army. A soldier can be a conscripted or volunteer enlisted person, a non-commissioned officer, or an officer. Etymology The word ''soldier'' derives from the Middle English word , from Old French ...

and

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...

. He is a former Chief of Defence Staff of the

Ghana Armed Forces The Ghana Armed Forces (GAF) is the unified armed force of Ghana, consisting of the Army (GA), Navy (GN), and Ghana Air Force. The Commander-in-Chief of the Ghana Armed Forces is the president of Ghana, who is also the supreme military commander ...

. He was also a member of the

Provisional National Defence Council The Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) was the name of the Ghanaian government after the People's National Party's elected government was overthrown by Jerry Rawlings, the former head of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council, in a coup ...

government which overthrew the government of Dr.

Hilla Limann Hilla Limann, (12 December 1934 – 23 January 1998) was a Ghanaian diplomat and politician who served the President of Ghana from 24 September 1979 to 31 December 1981. He served as a diplomat in Lome, Togo and Geneva, Switzerland. Education ...

in 1981.

Early life and education

Nunoo-Mensah was born at

Winneba Winneba is a town and the capital of Effutu Municipal District in Central Region of South Ghana. Winneba has a population of 55,331. Winneba, traditionally known as ''Simpa'', is a historic fishing port in south Ghana, lying on the south coa ...

in the Central Region of Ghana in 1939. He received his basic education at the Winneba Presbyterian Primary School and Winneba Methodist Middle School between 1945 and 1954. His secondary education was at the Ghana Secondary School, also at Winneba.

Career

Nunoo-Mensah enlisted with the Ghana Military Academy in 1961. Brigadier Nunoo-Mensah was appointed Chief of Defence Staff by the

Armed Forces Revolutionary Council The Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) was a group of Sierra Leone soldiers that allied itself with the rebel Revolutionary United Front in the late 1990s. While the AFRC briefly controlled the country in 1998, it was driven from the cap ...

government in 1979. Nunoo-Mensah was retired in November 1979 by the

People's National Party The People's National Party (PNP) is a Social democracy, social-democratic List of political parties in Jamaica, political party in Jamaica, founded in 1938 by independence campaigner Osmond Theodore Fairclough. It holds 14 of the 63 seats in ...

government of Dr. Limann.

Politics

Nunoo-Mensah was appointed a member of the PNDC on 2 January 1982. He however resigned in November 1982 over differences with Rawlings. He was a member of the

New Patriotic Party , logo = , colorcode = #132f7a , founder = , founded = 28 July 1992 , dissolved = , leader = Nana Akufo-Addo , chairman = Stephen Ayensu Ntim Stephen Ntim elected NPP National Chairman on fifth attempt http://www.gna.org.gh/1.2152672 ...

. He was the campaign manager for

Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo ( ; born 29 March 1944) is a Ghanaian politician who has served as the president of Ghana since 7 January 2017. In 2020, he was re-elected for his second term, which will end on 6 January 2025. Akufo-Addo previously ...

's bid for nomination as the party's candidate for the Ghanaian presidential elections in 1998. Nunoo-Mensah later defected from the

(NPP) to the National Democratic Congress (NDC), then in opposition. He and a number of former military and police capos were banned from all military and police installations by the ruling NPP government after they had attended a lunch meeting with former President Flt. Lt. J.J. Rawlings. Nunoo-Mensah was very instrumental in the campaign of the opposition NDC in the December 2008 elections in Ghana. In 2009, after the party won the elections he was made the National Security Advisor to the then newly elected president,

John Evans Atta Mills John Evans Fiifi Atta Mills (21 July 1944 – 24 July 2012) was a Ghanaian politician and legal scholar who served as President of Ghana from 2009 until his death in 2012. He was inaugurated on 7 January 2009, having defeated the governing party ...

of the NDC.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nunoo-Mensah, Joseph 1939 births Living people Ghanaian soldiers New Patriotic Party politicians National Democratic Congress (Ghana) politicians Chiefs of Army Staff (Ghana) Chiefs of the Defence Staff (Ghana) National Defence College, India alumni