Sex For Grades At UG – Prof. Gyampo’s Alleged Victim Speaks Out

An alleged victim of sexual harassment from the man in the middle of the sex-for-grades scandal at the University of Ghana, Prof. Ransford Gyampo, has spoken up for the first time about her ordeal in the hands of the lecturer.

Dela Goldheart, a former Political Science student at the premier University has revealed how Prof. Gyampo allegedly pestered her for sex for three whole years and then frustrated her from finishing her course because she never gave in.

In an interview this morning on Accra-based 3FM’s Sunrise program, the lady who has started a series of write-ups on her Facebook timeline about her ordeal, revealed that Prof. Gyampo had harassed her from Level 100 to Level 300.

“From 2010 to 2014 I was a student in the political science department of the University of Ghana and I met Prof. Gyampo in my very first semester. He approached me during one of his classes and he asked me to come to his office and that is how we started communicating. In level 100, he told me that I need to come to his house to prepare him okro soup. I am an Ewe, for those who don’t know me and okro is our staple food. So I basically told the Professor that I cannot come to his house and prepare okro soup for him. Unfortunately for me in level 300 the department assigned Prof. Gyampo to me as my supervisor and my thinking was that well, I know there’s going to be a problem but I just need to be mature and probably he has forgotten because I am just one student in many students.

“But from dealing with him from 2013 to 2014, it was clear Prof. Gyampo hadn’t forgotten, and he actually insisted that I need to come to his house and prepare the okro soup or did I think I was going to complete? And like joke, this professor ended up not supervising my work,” Madam Goldheart said.

She added that the encounter with Prof. Gyampo eventually led to an eye-opener that the University of Ghana was crawling with lecherous sex predators, because after Prof. Gyampo’s harassment had constrained her to seek help elsewhere, the same sexual demands were made of her as precondition by other lecturers.

“I ended up approaching at least three professors at the time, and it was the same story everywhere. The best I could get from one of the professors I was very close to was that I should manage and finish.”

The alleged victim’s revelation comes as a corroboration of a documentary that the BBC aired recently, exposing a widespread phenomenon of male lecturers on University campuses in Ghana and Nigeria, harassing female students for sex in exchange for good grades and other academic favors.

Excerpts of the, ‘Sex for Grades’ video capture Prof. Gyampo arranging a tryst with a lady who posed as a student of the University of Ghana in need of his help. After the lady had managed to convince him to rather meet at the mall, Prof. Gyampo had made a number of inappropriate remarks to the lady.

After the documentary had aired yesterday, the University of Ghana Anti-Sexual Harassment Committee had dismissed it saying the lady Prof. Gyampo had harassed in the video was not a student of the University of Ghana.

Dela Goldgeart’s decision to come forward, has had the Anti-Sexual Committee of the school having second thoughts. Chairperson of the Committee, Dr. Margaret Ivy Amoakohene, has urged all victims of sexual harassment to come forward with their complaints. “…Whoever thinks that they have been victimized, whoever thinks they are going through harassment of any kind this is the time for you to come out.”