The Director of the Port of Tema, Sandra Opoku has been conferred with a woman of excellence award for her outstanding contribution to the maritime transport industry in Ghana at the 6th Ghana Women of Excellence Awards held in Accra.
This year’s Ghana Women of Excellence Awards which is the 6th edition, acknowledge and celebrate distinguished women who are challenging the status quo and making positive impacts in society in their fields of chosen careers.
The awards ceremony coincided with this year’s International Women’s Day, celebrated on March 8 every year.
Mrs. Sandra Opoku is the first female Director of Port in the history of the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority and has been steering affairs at Ghana’s largest commercial port since her appointment in 2019.
A maritime lawyer by profession, Mrs. Sandra Opoku shared her career journey in what is widely considered as a male dominated maritime industry.
“I started off as a temporary staff for over 6 months at GPHA and became a legal officer, where I rose to become a legal manager in 2008. Later I became the Acting Solicitor Secretary for 2 and half years. The board recognized the work that I did and gave me a citation for that. I then went back to my duties as a legal manager. I later became the General Manager, Administration in 2017. That is where the bigger responsibilities came up. I went back to the legal department as General Manager, Legal. For GPHA, I have been through the ranks and finally as the Director of Port, I have moved on from legal to do more administration and operations. Every day you learn something new.
There are always challenges. But life is nothing if there aren’t any challenges and I live to surmount those challenges,” she narrated.
She explained that these accomplishments would not only honor her, but would encourage other women participating in the port and maritime industry, to work hard and earn their place.
“A lot of people call and tell me I am their role model. But this comes with its own responsibilities. Because you are being looked at and watched. You are also mentoring people, so you do not take it lightly. It only spurs you on to work harder and improve the lots of other women in the industry who would want to follow my footsteps.”
The Director of Tema Port indicated that, the Port of Tema, despite the disruptions of Covid-19, delivered on its target in 2020 and is poised to do well in 2021.
“We look forward to better days. Even though 2020 was quite difficult but the maritime industry was spared we still moved a lot of cargo and we hope to move more cargo, and for the Port of Tema, to deliver excellent service to our customers.”