Award-winning writer, journalist, social commentator and comedian Akua Djanie-Manfo aka Blakofe has lamented that she wasted her youth in Ghana after she left the UK for her native Ghana aged 25.

Ms Akua Djanie-Manfo worked in Ghana mainly as a creative arts person, creating content for advertisements, managing award-winning singers, writing deeply reflective articles for magazines, promoting tourism in Ghana, founding and working in an educational NGO among others.

Notwithstanding, she has described those years in Ghana as wasted years of her youth.

“Late 20s/ early 30s and so fresh! I wonder how life would have been if I hadn’t wasted my youth in Gh. I was beautiful, talented, extremely creative and passionate. I can only wonder if I had pursued my career elsewhere… Ah well!” She lamented with a throwback picture of hers sighted by MyNewsGh.com

Upon the assumption of power of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in 2017, Blakofe was appointed as Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Tourist Development Company by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

But in 2018, he resigned, saying that her skills and competencies were not being utilized by the government agency.

Blakofe is especially famed for her writing skills, her love for Ghana and Africa at large and her Pan-African ideals.

She is an author and known for her much-read book, Reflections of an Ordinary Woman, a collection of her articles first published in the New Africa Magazine.

Blakofe has won several awards for her work, including the ‘Best Journalist 2011 by the Ghana/UK Society Media Awards.