'Akufo-Addo has not said he will rename UG' - Prof Kweku Asare

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has not proposed the renaming of the University of Ghana after anybody, Kweku Asare, a U.S.-based Ghanaian Law Professor, has said.

Some Ghanaians have criticised Mr Akufo-Addo on social media after he recently said that his uncle, Joseph Boakye Danquah, who was one of the Big Six, founded the University of Ghana, Legon.

The president told an audience at the launch of an Endowment Fund to commemorate the school’s 70th anniversary that: “It will be wholly appropriate and not at all far-fetched to describe Joseph Boakye Danquah as the founder of this University.”

In the president’s view, the British colonialists who built the university, were inspired by J.B. Danquah when they initially intended to build for British West Africa, a single university in Nigeria.

“How felicitous was that decision and how greatly it has contributed to the growth of modern Ghana, it will be wholly appropriate and not at all far-fetched to describe Joseph Boakye Danquah as the founder of this University…. The fact which on the 70th anniversary of the university’s existence should be vividly recalled that all of us are the beneficiaries of his work,” Akufo-Addo said.

The president’s comments sparked suspicions that he intends renaming Ghana’s premier university.

Joining the social media conversation on the matter, Prof Asare said: “To the best of my knowledge, the President has not proposed to rename the University of Ghana.”