Former President of Ghana, Jerry Rawlings is dead.
Rawlings, according to reports, died at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra, capital of Ghana, on Thursday morning, from COVID-19 complications.
As both a military ruler, and president, Rawlings ruled Ghana for a total of 20 years, between 1981 to 2001, serving two terms as the democratically elected president of Ghana.
As a young flight lieutenant of the Ghanaian Air Force, Rawlings first staged military coup on May 15, 1979, five weeks before scheduled elections to return the country to civilian rule.
When the coup failed, he was imprisoned, publicly court-martialed and sentenced to death.
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).
He retired from the military, founded the National Democratic Congress (NDC), and became the first president of the Fourth Republic.
In 2000, Rawlings endorsed his Vice President John Atta Mills as presidential candidate.
He was born on June 22, 1947.
