Parliament on Thursday paid glowing tribute to the memory of the late Member of Parliament (MP) for Navrongo Central, Joseph Kofi Adda.
Mr Adda died on Thursday, October 14, 2021, at a hospital in Accra after a short ailment.
The House described him as a selfless politician and democrat, gem, gentleman, statesman, and a true patriot.
The MPs bowed their heads in a minute’s silence to remember their former colleague and said thoughts of him would forever linger in their minds, adding that he would be missed dearly.
All the MPs who contributed to the tribute were unanimous in their contributions that the late Adda was a peacemaker who was respected by MPs from both sides of the House.
They were all of the conviction that the late Adda’s humility and appeal to both sides of the House were readily recognised by both President John Kufuor, who appointed him in 2005 as the Minister for Manpower Development and Employment and later Energy Minister in 2006.
President Nana Akufo-Addo also appointed him as the Minister for Aviation in 2017.
The MP for Navrongo Central, Sampson Tangombu Chiragia, who set the tone for the tribute in a statement he read on the floor said the late MP was a distinguished statesman who was concerned about nation-building and did not consider politics as a matter of life or death.
He emphasised that their late colleague was, without doubt, a humble and quiet person who showed respect to everybody irrespective of that person’s position and remained loyal and faithful to the course of the House, and was indeed affable.
The late Adda, a Financial Economist and a Management Consultant, was born at Navrongo, the capital of the Kassena-Nankana District in the Upper East Region of Ghana on 22nd April 1956.
He had his secondary education at St. John’s School, Sekondi, and obtained a Bachelor of Science (BSc) degree in politics and economics from the Indiana Wesleyan University, Marion, Indiana, the United States, which he attended between 1979 and 1982.
Between 1982 and 1984, he was at Columbia University, New York, where he studied for a Master’s degree in International Affairs, specialising in Finance and Banking, and went on to get a graduate certificate in African Studies from the same university.
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The late Adda first entered Parliament in 2003 after winning the Navrongo Central parliamentary seat in a by-election after the death of then sitting MP, John Achuliwor and subsequently retained his seat in the 2004 general election and served in various capacities under the Kufuor administration.
He retained the seat in 2008 when the NPP lost the general election and lost it in 2012 to the National Democratic Congress candidate Mark Woyongo.
He, however, won it back in the 2016 election but lost it in the NPP’s parliamentary primary ahead of the 2020 election.