GOVERNANCE & LEADERSHIP

Mr. Phillipe Ayivor is the Board Chairman. Mr. Ayivor worked for Andersen Consulting and The Coca-Cola Company (TCCC) in the US and Africa over a 33-year period until May 2013. 

He held various senior management positions across Africa managing TCCC’s business operations and relationships with governments, civil society, bottlers, customers, consumers, and other organizations in multiple countries across Sub-Saharan Africa. 

He is active in several private sector governance roles in Ghana. Mr. Ayivor is the former President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ghana.

Mr. Emmanuel Barima Manu, Esq. is a co-founding member and Managing Partner of Bari & Co. He has extensive experience in corporate, investment, and commercial practice and holds a master’s degree in international Commercial Law.

 He is a non-executive director at Fidelity Bank Ghana Limited. Mr. Manu serves as the corporate secretary of the DTI Board.

Madam Amy Fafa Awoonor is a passionate educator whose career in international school education spans over 30 years. 

She was the former principal at Roman Ridge School and has held several positions in education as a teacher, training consultant, and in senior management.

Mr. Joe Mensah is the Senior Vice-President (SVP) and Head of Ghana Business Unit at Kosmos Energy. As SVP and Head of Ghana Business Unit, Mr. Mensah is responsible for the overall performance of the Ghana Business Unit, maintaining strong relationships with partners, government and civil society, and advancing the company’s social investment programs, including the activities of the Kosmos Innovation Center.

Mr. Mensah joined Kosmos in 2015 and served as the Ghana Vice President and Country Manager until 2019. He previously worked for IBM Ghana, where he was the Country General Manager in charge of all aspects of the company's operations. During his more than 30 years with IBM, Mr. Mensah held a variety of leadership roles in sales and marketing before establishing IBM's presence in Ghana in 2009.

Ms. Velda Sosah is the Finance Director for ePac Flexible Packaging, a digitally-based flexible packaging company driven by a mission to help brands of all sizes stay competitive with exceptional stand up pouches, lay flat pouches and rollstock. She is a Board Member for Maxim Nyansa IT Solutions and has served since September 2020 till date.

Ms. Velda Sosah served as the Managing Director-Tax, for Hines, Europe. She joined Hines’ London office in 1999 and she assumed her role as Head of the European Tax Group in 2004. She has extensive experience of all taxation aspects of real estate, including fund structuring, acquisition structuring, financing, and repatriation issues. Prior to joining Hines, Ms Sosah worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers in London and New York, specializing in International Tax and Banking Tax respectively. Ms. Sosah is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, and holds a BA in Accounting and Finance from Brighton University.

Mr. Boamah is a seasoned finance and development professional with over 40 years of experience spanning banking, auditing, and international development finance. He served with distinction at the African Development Bank Group (AfDB) from 1996 to 2020, holding progressively senior roles, including Senior Vice-President, Vice-President, and Chief Financial Officer (CFO), as well as Senior Director & Controller.

In these roles, he provided strategic leadership over financial sustainability, capital market operations, and corporate restructuring initiatives, while also chairing critical committees that reviewed all major sovereign and non-sovereign investment decisions of the AfDB. He was instrumental in resource mobilisation  efforts,  including  the  General  Capital  Increase  and  African  Development  Fund replenishments.

Prior to joining the AfDB, Mr. Boamah held leadership roles at First Interstate Bancorp (now Wells Fargo) and trained with Coopers & Lybrand (now PwC) in Ghana and the USA. He has also served on several high-profile boards and committees, including Africa50, Afreximbank, UNICEF Audit Advisory Committee, and the Development Bank of Ghana, where he chaired audit and finance committees. He holds a B.Sc. in Administration (Finance & Accounting) from the University of Ghana, an MBA in Finance from UCLA, and is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) licensed in California.

Ms. Larbi is an accomplished marketing and business development leader with nearly three decades of experience in strategic marketing, brand management, and business expansion. She is the Managing Director of Ovalworkshop Ltd, where she provides marketing and business consultancy services for clients across oil & gas, agriculture, hospitality, and health sectors.

Previously, she served as Head of Marketing for Coca-Cola (Equatorial Africa), where she directed marketing operations across nine countries, managed a portfolio exceeding USD 10 million, and delivered substantial volume and revenue growth, notably through the 'Share a Coke' campaign. She also oversaw the launch of new product innovations, including Coca-Cola’s first global dark malt beverage. Earlier in her career, she held marketing leadership roles at Unilever, managing flagship product portfolios across Ghana and sub-Saharan Africa.

Her expertise in strategic planning, market expansion, and cross-functional leadership has earned her several recognitions, including the CIMG Marketing Practitioner of the Year (2014). She holds an Executive MBA from CEIBS (China Europe International Business School), a qualification in Strategic Management & Marketing from Henley Management College, UK, and a B.Sc. in Food Science with Biochemistry from the University of Ghana.