Former Ghanaian President Jerry John Rawlings died today 12 November 2020 at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra, Ghana from COVID-19 complication.
Rawlings was a retired Ghanaian military officer and politician who led the country from 1981 to 2001 and also for a brief period in 1979. He led a military junta until 1992, and then served two terms as the democratically elected President of Ghana as the first in the 4th republic.
Rawlings initially came to power in Ghana as a flight lieutenant of the Ghana Air Force following a coup d’état in 1979. Prior to that, he led an unsuccessful coup attempt against the ruling military government on 15 May 1979, just five weeks before scheduled democratic elections were due to take place.
After initially handing power over to a civilian government, he took back control of the country on 31 December 1981 as the Chairman of the Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC). In 1992, Rawlings resigned from the military, founded the National Democratic Congress (NDC), and became the first President of the Fourth Republic. He was re-elected in 1996 for four more years.
After two terms in office, the limit according to the Ghanaian Constitution, Rawlings endorsed his vice-president John Atta Mills as presidential candidate in 2000. He served as the African Union envoy to Somalia.
Jerry John Rawlings in one of his presidential addresses made this one statement and it became his nickname.
Ghanaian people fondly referred to him as Chairman Rawlings, and also in one of his presidential speech, he made a statement about “Boom” which got him the nickname. The people celebrated his charismatic style of leadership which made him one of the most popular leader of the West African nation.