President Akufo-Addo has appointed Hayford Siaw as the acting Director of the Ghana Library Authority.
A letter from the Presidency indicated that, the appointment was in pursuant to Section (6) (1) (a) of the Ghana Library Authority Act 327.
Hayford Siaw, a former director of Street Library will serve in an acting capacity until approval by the governing board of the Library Authority in consultation with the Public Services Commission.
Mr. Siaw, a social entrepreneur and development consultant, takes over from Mrs. Rebecca Odua Akita.
Hayford Siaw founded Street Library in 2011, and has grown it to serve six regions of Ghana and three other African countries.
He is a skillful negotiator and fundraiser, who mobilizes resources from partners across the world to support his initiatives.
Among his notable innovations within Street Library include a mobile crowd-sourcing platform for oral narratives in Africa, currently funded by European Commission, and with partners including Fraunhofer PT and Microsoft PT.
Also in partnership with a telecommunication company, Tigo, Hayford launched the first Electronic Library on Wheels service in West Africa in 2015, which currently serves over 20,000 children annually in Ghana through varied library modules he developed.
He is also the founder of Volunteer Partnerships for West Africa, an organization that specialized in recruitment and placement of volunteers from around the globe on development projects in Ghana and Liberia.
Mr. Siaw is a Ford Motors International Fellow, Goodwill Ambassador for World NGO Day, and a Tigo-Reach for Change, Change Leader.
He holds an Executive MBA from University of Ghana Business School with specialization in Project Management and in addition, he has undertaken training in Leadership and Management from Picker Center for Executive Education of the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, USA.
About the Ghana Library Authority
The Ghana Library Authority (GLA) formerly known as Ghana Library Board has as its mandate, promoting lifelong reading habits among Ghanaians especially the youth, and has a vision of establishing public libraries throughout the country.
This mandate appears to have been poorly executed over the years amidst a deprivation of the Authority of needed resources by the government to carry out its mandate.
Most initiatives to promote reading in the country has mainly been private initiatives with very little seen of the Authority.
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By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana