A. Kwame Pianim is a celebrated Ghana

Ghana

Ghana , officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country located in West Africa. It is bordered by Côte d'Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, Togo to the east, and the Gulf of Guinea to the south...

ian business economist

Business economics

Business economics as a field in applied economics uses economic theory and quantitative methods to analyze business enterprises and the factors contributing to the diversity of organizational structures and the relationships of firms with labour, capital and product markets...

 and investment consultant. After ten years as a political prisoner

Political prisoner

According to the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, a political prisoner is ‘someone who is in prison because they have opposed or criticized the government of their own country’....

, he made a 1996 bid to run for the presidency of Ghana

President of Ghana

The President of Ghana is the elected head of state and head of government of Ghana. Officially styled President of the Republic of Ghana and Commander-in-Chief of the Ghanaian Armed Forces. The current President of Ghana is Prof. John Atta Mills, who took office in January...

. Switching gears, he found success as a businessman in Accra

Accra

Accra is the capital and largest city of Ghana, with an urban population of 1,658,937 according to the 2000 census. Accra is also the capital of the Greater Accra Region and of the Accra Metropolitan District, with which it is coterminous...

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Family

He is married to a Dutch

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

 woman named Cornelia Pianim. Their son Elkin Kwesi Pianim (born 1970), a Vassar College

Vassar College

Vassar College is a private, coeducational liberal arts college in the town of Poughkeepsie, New York, in the United States. The Vassar campus comprises over and more than 100 buildings, including four National Historic Landmarks, ranging in style from Collegiate Gothic to International,...

 trained corporate financier, married global media magnate Elisabeth Murdoch

Elisabeth Murdoch (businesswoman)

Elisabeth Murdoch is an executive in the British television industry and a daughter of international media mogul Rupert Murdoch...

; Kwame Pianim thus has two grandchildren in common with Rupert Murdoch

Rupert Murdoch

Keith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG is an Australian-American business magnate. He is the founder and Chairman and CEO of , the world's second-largest media conglomerate....

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Political career

His attempts to contest the 1996 presidential elections on the ticket of the centre-right New Patriotic Party

New Patriotic Party

-External links:*...

 were scuppered when the Supreme Court

Supreme court

A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of many legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, instance court, judgment court, high court, or apex court...

 ruled to uphold a controversial law preventing individuals convicted of treasonous acts from holding public office, even if such acts were committed during periods of unconstitutional rule.

Following the Court's decision, he resigned from politics to focus on private activities within the realm of development economics

Development economics

Development Economics is a branch of economics which deals with economic aspects of the development process in low-income countries. Its focus is not only on methods of promoting economic growth and structural change but also on improving the potential for the mass of the population, for example,...

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Economic and finance career

As an economist, his philosophy is multi-dimensional, but a consistent theme has been the essential incompatibility between the economic agenda of poor nations, or what ought to be their economic agenda, and the priorities of the Bretton Woods system

Bretton Woods system

The Bretton Woods system of monetary management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the world's major industrial states in the mid 20th century...

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Recent activities

He was once the chairman of the Public Utility Regulation Council (PURC) of Ghana, a high-level commission tasked with the responsibility of overseeing and regulating electricity and water utilities. He however resigned in December 2007 as a result of differences with the then ruling NPP government of John A. Kuffuor.