Leadership Journey
From village roads to global stages.
The leadership journey did not begin in a boardroom or a lecture hall. It began on a family motorbike, riding into communities that had no clean water, no functioning schools, and no one coming to help. What Richard found there shaped everything that came after.
“The work that no one sees is the work that builds the character behind the work that everyone eventually notices.”
Early Beginnings · Ghana
Community roots and the leadership instinct.
Richard's leadership story began in the Western North Region of Ghana. Before any formal title or programme, he was already making choices that leaders make: showing up, organising, and asking what could be done differently. He joined church campaigns, partnered with the NCCE on peace advocacy, and participated in radio education tours across Sefwi Bekwai and the wider region.
These early experiences gave him something that no academic programme can teach: the knowledge of what it actually means to live in a community where systems have failed, and the unshakeable conviction that this does not have to be permanent.
Into the Communities
Riding into villages with no clean water, on a family motorbike.
During his time in Sefwi Bekwai, Richard visited many surrounding communities that had no access to safe drinking water. Riding on a family motorbike, he documented the conditions firsthand: families sharing water sources with animals, borehole covers broken and contaminated, children walking long distances for water that still was not clean.
He did not just observe. He motivated community youth to organise around their borehole maintenance, connected with local leaders, and made the case that sanitation and water access are not abstract development goals but daily survival.
Visiting a community with no clean water, Sefwi Bekwai area
Communities sharing water with animals due to scarcity
Documenting water access conditions
The realities that rarely made it into any report
Community Action
Motivating communities for sanitation, one exercise at a time.
Richard organised and participated in sanitation exercises across DansoKrom and Surano B in the Sefwi Bekwai area. These were not symbolic events. They were early morning clean-ups, gutter clearances, and communal area maintenance drives that he personally led alongside community members.
The work was unglamorous and unphotographed by anyone but him. But it taught him something essential: sustainable development starts with people believing their environment is worth protecting. Empowerment is not about giving people things. It is about giving them back a sense of ownership.
Community clean-up exercise, DansoKrom, Sefwi Bekwai
Motivating youth to take action on sanitation
Clearing drains and communal areas, DansoKrom
Sanitation exercise, Sefwi Bekwai Surano B
Volunteer Teaching
When schools closed during COVID-19, Richard opened his own.
When COVID-19 forced schools to close across Ghana in 2020, Richard did not wait. He organised free morning and night teaching sessions in multiple communities around Sefwi Bekwai, using whatever classrooms he could access and motivating children to keep learning when the world had given them every excuse to stop.
He funded small celebrations with his uncle's support, giving out gifts and running quiz competitions to keep morale high. He taught literacy and numeracy, but more importantly, he showed young people that someone cared enough to show up for them, even during the hard times.
This period, more than any other, crystallised what would become EGA Mentorship International: the conviction that structured, sustained support transforms outcomes in ways that sporadic goodwill never can.
Night classes during COVID-19 lockdown
Free morning teaching, community classroom
Teaching community youth, Sefwi Bekwai
Students showing up even when schools were closed
Youth Movements
Co-founding the Sefwi Bekwai Youth Movement and reaching Parliament House.
Richard co-founded the Sefwi Bekwai Youth Movement, a grassroots platform to organise and empower youth in his district. This evolved into the Sefwi Bekwai Youth Parliament. He also represented the region in the UNYA-Ghana Youth Parliament at Parliament House in Accra, contributing to national youth policy discussions and local governance conversations.
He went on to engage with the Bibiani Anhwiaso Municipal Youth Parliament and founded the Ubuntu UEW Chapter during his university years, taking the spirit of community leadership into institutional settings.
Sefwi Bekwai Youth Movement, media engagement
UNYA-Ghana Youth Parliament, Parliament House, Accra
Bibiani Anhwiaso Municipal Youth Parliament
Ubuntu UEW Chapter founding
Academic and Professional · UK
Expanding the lens through global institutions.
Moving to the United Kingdom opened Richard to new intellectual environments, policy frameworks, and research methodologies. He engaged with institutions that helped him see his community's challenges not as local aberrations, but as global patterns requiring systemic responses, and brought that rigour back home.
Cross-Border and Ongoing
Connecting Ghana, the UK, and global partners.
Richard has built a network of 65+ mentors, professionals, researchers, founders, and civic leaders across the globe. He has travelled to 8 countries for conferences, engagements, and field programmes, always with the same goal: to bring what he learns back to the communities that need it most.
What it built
Everything above was the foundation for EGA Mentorship International.
One of Richard's most sustained contributions has been helping establish and grow EGA Mentorship International, a programme now supporting hundreds of young people seeking academic and professional advancement. He has helped more than 120 people navigate study abroad applications, with 35+ securing fully funded pathways.