Joana Gyan Cudjoe

Joana Gyan Cudjoe is a Ghanaian businesswoman, gold exporter, women's rights advocate and politician born on 7 May 1984 in Wassa Agona Amenfi in the Western Region, who serves as the Member of Parliament for the Amenfi Central constituency. A member of the National Democratic Congress and the first female NDC representative elected to Parliament from Amenfi Central, she overcame a pre-election disqualification challenge by the Electoral Commission to win the December 2024 general election with the highest vote total ever recorded in the constituency's history.

Professional background

Cudjoe has built her professional career as a businesswoman in the Western Region's gold economy, becoming known as the only female gold exporter in Ghana, a distinction in a sector that remains heavily male-dominated and where the involvement of local private individuals in the export chain is unusual. Her commercial engagement with the gold trade gives her an insider's understanding of the artisanal and small-scale mining sector that is central to the Western Region's economy and central to the livelihoods of many communities within Amenfi Central. Beyond her business career, she has worked as a women's rights advocate, engaging with the economic and social challenges facing women in mining communities and the broader Western Region context.

Disqualification challenge and 2024 victory

Her path to Parliament was complicated when the Electoral Commission disqualified her from the December 2024 general election in October 2024, citing a pending court case in which she was accused of knowingly forging her NDC party card to satisfy the party's four-year membership requirement under its guidelines. She and the NDC challenged the disqualification in court and ultimately contested and won the parliamentary election. Her victory brought 26,345 votes against the NPP candidate Dr Albert Wiredu Arkoh who received 12,096 votes, a majority of over 14,000 that broke records for the highest individual vote total ever recorded in an Amenfi Central parliamentary election. She is the first woman to win the Amenfi Central seat on the NDC ticket.

Political Legacy

Joana Gyan Cudjoe's record-breaking victory in Amenfi Central, delivered after overcoming a last-minute disqualification challenge, marks her parliamentary entry as one of the most dramatic of the 2024 election cycle. Her status as Ghana's only female gold exporter and first-ever NDC MP for Amenfi Central gives her political identity a foundation in both business achievement and historic constituency representation.