Entrepreneur and Director-General of the Ghana Technical Vocational Education and Training Service, Mawusi Nudekor Awit, has disclosed how her childhood experience with her stepmother has contributed to her success.
Though her father was a superintendent, she had a terrible childhood as she struggled to continue her education in high school.
The Director-General further narrated how she needed to sell firewood and other things at age 11 to feed her younger sister and herself in a village where she was sent to by the stepmother.
This, she said has toughened her and helped in the development of her entrepreneurial skills.
Speaking in an exclusive interview on Joy Prime’s morning show with host Roselyn Felli, she said “my father was the work superintendant of the University of Ghana but somewhere along the line, my life was like a labrourer’s child. I was asked not to go to secondary school but go and learn a trade and come and start earning money. For me, that is what that has made me what I am today.”
Asked if she was maltreated by her a stepmother, she said: “At that time as a child I took as maltreatment but that toughened me because at a point I was just dumped in a village with another half-sister of mine who was about three years old. It got to a time I had to cut firewood to sell before we get money to buy food and I was there for about two and a half years.”
She believes that it is because of this that she has become a successful social entrepreneur who is enthusiastic about changing the lives of the underprivileged in society.
Her father opposed her entering to high school, but she persisted and got enrolled with the help of a friend and former headmistress of Eburi Girls’ SHS.
Apart from her position as the Director-General of TVET, she has other achievements including the 7th Best Performing CEO in Ghana (2019); MTN 2019 Heroes of Change Award; Leading Innovative Women Honorary Award (2013) by the Global Women Innovative Network, UK, and Government of Ghana, among others.