Harry Sawyerr

Harry Sawyerr was born on 25 April 1926 in Abokobi, Accra, in the Ga East District, to Kwao Sawyerr and Fredericka Naa Awula Akua Lokko.[2] He had his early education at the Presbyterian Primary School at Abokobi from 1932 to 1938, continuing in 1938 to the Salem School at Osu. He studied at the Accra Academy for his secondary education between 1942 and 1946. He entered Achimota College in 1947, but on the sudden death of his father that year, Sawyerr's degree studies ended due to lack of funds, and he became a Learner Valuer at the Lands Department from 1951 to 1953.[2] He subsequently studied estate management in England at the University College of Estate Management (1953–55),[2] becoming a certified associate of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, in England.[3]

He worked as a District Valuer at the Lands Department in Accra (1955–58), then left public service to establish his private consultancy from 1958 to 1962. From 1962 to 1963, he was City Valuer at Kumasi City Council and worked as Chief Federal Lands Officer in the Federal Republic of Nigeria from 1963 to 1967, the first black Chief Federal Lands Officer in Nigeria.[2] He was organiser and later the National Co-ordinator of the Association of Recognised Professional Bodies, from 1971 to 1979.[4]

His political career began as a member of the Ghana Congress Party led by Kofi Abrefa Busia.[5]

Sawyerr was made a member of the 1969 Constituent Assembly that drew up the 1969 Constitution for the second Republic of Ghana. He contested the 1969 parliamentary election in the Osu-Klottey constituency as a non-party candidate and won.[6] He was the only non-party candidate to win a seat in the Parliament of the second republic.[7]

At the onset of the third republic, he was a founding member of the United National Convention (UNC). whose flagbearer was William Ofori-Atta. Sawyerr stood for election to parliament at the Osu-Klottey constituency on the ticket of the UNC.[8] He won the parliamentary seat but gave it up to serve as Minister for Transport and Communications from 1979 to 1981 in the Limann government.[9]

Sawyerr joined the National Democratic Congress (NDC) under the leadership of Jerry Rawlings in 1992 and served as the Chairman of its National Campaign Committee in 1992. He served as Minister for Education in the Rawlings government from 1993 to 1997.[10] In 1998, Sawyerr was appointed a member of the Council of State, on which he served until 2000.[11] He was Vice Chairman of the council of elders of the NDC.[11]

Sawyerr served as a longstanding vice-chairman of the Council of Patrons of Accra Hearts of Oak S.C. and later became the President of the football club's Council of Patrons.[12][13]

Harry Sawyerr was a Freemason, belonging to the District Grand Lodge of Ghana under the United Grand Lodge of England.[14]

He died on 8 November 2013 in Accra,[15] aged 87.[16] His funeral was attended by several government officials and dignitaries.[17][18] He was buried at the Basel Mission Cemetery in Osu.[17]

Sawyerr was the first Executive Chairman of the University of Ghana Medical School, appointed in 1990.[19] There are prizes at the University of Ghana Medical School in his name.[11][20]

In 2011, Sawyerr was decorated with the Companion of the Order of the Volta, the highest award in Ghana, by the then President John Evans Atta Mills.[19][21]

• List of MPs elected in the 1969 Ghanaian parliamentary election
• List of MPs elected in the 1979 Ghanaian parliamentary election
• Limann government
• Rawlings government

• Commemorative Tributes in the Parliament of Ghana in honour of Henry Romulus Sawyerr, 18 December 2013