PW/1 Rosemond Asiamah Nkansah, a pioneer in the Ghanaian police, was born on January 13, 1930.
As the first woman to join the Ghana Police Service and then the Gold Coast Police Force, she made history.
Rosamond Asiamah Nkansah, PW-1
The police force had been predominately male since its founding in 1894 until that point.
She attended Wesley Girls High School in Cape Coast and held a "A" grade teaching certificate as well as Senior Cambridge. Before joining the police, she briefly taught.
According to data held by the Ghana Police Service, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the then-leader of government business, saw the necessity for women to be represented in the police force and approved the novel hiring of women.
12 female recruits were enlisted on September 1, 1952, as a result of that decision and after three months of intensive training, with the intention of handling issues and problems affecting women, children, and teenagers who were either missing, were the victims of crime, or had been accused of committing a crime.
first female police unit (08-10-1952)
At the age of 22, Rosemond Nkansah led the other 11 women in performing their patriotic duty.
first female police unit (08-10-1952)
It's interesting to note that at the time, policewomen were forbidden from getting married or having children, and if they did, they were forced to resign.
PW/1 Rosemond Asiamah made the decision to leave from the Ghana Police Service after serving there for five years and nine months because she wanted to be married and start a family.
In the interim, she petitioned the government prior to her resignation to allow policewomen to marry and have children, as well as to reinstate those who left in order to start families.
She believed it was unfair and a violation of women's rights to prevent them from getting married and having children while allowing their male counterparts to do so and spend quality time with their wives and kids.
Her request was granted, and the rule that barred women from serving on the force for an extended period of time owing to marriage and childbirth was fully eliminated.
She then announced her resignation on May 16, 1958. She had a teaching qualification before joining the Gold Coast Police Force, therefore she used it to teach at St. John's Grammar School from 1961 to 1964 as a professional teacher out of a desire to continue serving her country.
In 1965, she began working for the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, where she oversaw the school broadcasting programmes for a full year.
She left the military in 1999 so that she could concentrate on authoring books. Also, she translated terms from her novel (Octagon) into both local and foreign languages.
At the age of 91, Asiamah passed away on Saturday night, February 20, 2021, in the Police Hospital in Accra.
Prior to her passing, PW/1 Asiama's family, members of the Police Ladies Association (POLAS), and retired female police officers attended a ceremony in Accra to honour her 90th birthday.
Several of the first 12 police women were present for the birthday celebration, which was hosted at the High Gate Hotel in Accra.
They were PW6 Gladys Parker-French now known as Mrs. Gladys Korankye and PW4 Adelaide Tagoe, now Mrs. Adelaide Appiah.
They joined the senior colleague's friends and family to celebrate her 90th birthday in spite of their advanced age and poor health.
Years after joining the Gold Coast Police Force, seven of them have passed on to their eternal rest, leaving the Lord with five.
The elderly person was pleased to see more police women working for the department and that one of them was appointed as the first acting inspector general of police at the ceremony (IGP).
PW/1 Asiama's family joined members of the Police Ladies Association (POLAS) and retired female police officers to commemorate her 90th birthday.
PW/1 Asiamah claimed that despite their best efforts to open the door for more women to join the military, they never imagined that policewomen would achieve such high levels of success.
Because the highest rank for women at the time was Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP), she remarked, "It is heart-warming to hear that a policewoman served as the IGP while others are now commissioners and deputy commissioners.
To honour her forever, she and her 11 coworkers provided the current generation of policewomen a reason to want to join the force and inspired them to smash all barriers of gender in terms of policing.
In order to maintain peace and order, more policewomen are now commanding combat operations as District and Divisional Police Commanders.
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