The reigning monarch of the United Kingdom (UK), King Charles III, has extended condolences to the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, over the death of Asantehemaa, Nana Konadu Yiadom III. According to a letter dated August 14 and addressed from Buckingham Palace, King Charles noted that he was filled with sorrow after hearing the passing of the Asantehemaa.
King Charles described the late Queen Mother as one who served as a role model for good leadership and decision-making.“Her Royal Majesty demonstrated a deep devotion to preserving the traditions and unity of the Ashanti throughout her life, and served as an exemplar of wise, fair, and gracious judgment and counsel,” King Charles wrote.
The Queen Mother, who is also the sister of the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei TuTu II, was laid to rest with a befitting burial on Thursday, September 18, at the Manhyia Palace in the Ashanti Region following three days of funeral rites.
President John Dramani Mahama, former Presidents John Kofi Agyekum Kufuor and Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, former Vice President Dr Bawumia, and Chief of Staff, Frema Opare, government officials, and other dignitaries were spotted at the funeral grounds paying their last respects to Nana Ama Konadu Yiadom III.
Shops, schools, banks, markets, and offices in Kumasi were closed on Thursday for the final funeral rites of the Queen Mother. Residents also remained indoors on Thursday evening as the procession moved from Bantama to Breman.
Nana Ama Konadu Yiadom II passed away at age 98 as the 14th Queen of the Asante Kingdom. Her passing was announced on August 11 at an emergency sitting of the Asanteman Traditional Council, which was presided over by the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II.
A one-week observation was held at the forecourt of the Manhyia Palace in Kumasi for the late Queen Mother on August 21. It followed a display of traditional Asante customs, with chiefs, queen mothers, and government officials.
The ceremony was nothing short of star-studded, as it saw the presence of dignitaries, including both current and past presidents and government officials. Former presidents John Agyekum and Akufo-Addo, and Vice President Professor Naana Jane, who was accompanied by the Chief Justice, Julius Debrah.
They paid respects to the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, and signed the Book of Condolence as a gesture of sharing in his sorrow. The funeral rites for the Queen Mother began on Monday, September 15, and continued through to Thursday, September 18.
Thursday was earmarked for the late queen’s “Dɔte Yie”, a day reserved for the most sacred rites. Traditional drumming, dirges, and musketry filled the air with various cultural displays. Fetish priests performed rituals to cleanse and protect the royal passage.
Tributes from Otumfuo himself, President Mahama, the late queen’s grandchildren, as well as one from her sister in-law, Lady Julia, wife of Asantehene.
A group of men, painted in red clay, signifying the pain of Asanteman, also came to display after the chief executioner was captured, tearing off the head of a live chicken in a cold-blooded sacrificial act, signifying that Asanteman is in mourning, and the ancestral spirits have been summoned to receive the soul of the departed Queen Mother.
Manhyia Palace in Kumasi received Ghanaian sympathisers following the passing of Nana Ama Konadu Yiadom III. On Monday, September 15, religious groups, political parties, and corporate bodies paid their respects. The judiciary, security agencies, and financial institutions followed the next day.
Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei TuTu II, received traditional leaders, ministers of state, diplomats, parliamentarians, and MMDCEs on Tuesday. On Wednesday, August 13, the Archbishop of Kumasi, Most Rev. Gabriel Justice Anokye, led a delegation to the Manhyia Palace to pray for the Asantehene and to express their condolences to the King, after the demise of the Asantehemaa.
They also visited the late Ohemaa’s court to formally convey their sympathies to the family and offer prayers as well. Asantehemaa was named Nana Ama Konadu at birth and is also known by all as Nana Panin or Naa Panin. She later became Nana Konadu Yiadom III, after her enstoolment as the 14th Asantehemaa on February 6, 2016, following the demise of her mother, Nana Afia Kobi Serwaa Ampem II.
Nana Konadu Yiadom III was born in 1927 at Benyaade Shrine at Merdan, a small town located at Kwadaso, Kumasi, in the days of the restoration of the Asante Confederacy. She was born to Nana Afia Kobi Serwaa Ampem II, Asantehemaa, who reigned from 1977 to 2016. Her father was known as Opanin Kofi Fofie, known popularly as Koofie or Keewuo, a carpenter by profession from Besease near Atimatim in Kumasi.
At a very tender age, just when she was a little over a year old and being breastfed, Nana Konadu Yiadom III, Asantehemaa, was separated from her biological mother and given to her aunt (mother’s sister), Nana Afia Konadu, at Ashanti New Town (Ash-Town), a suburb of Kumasi.
Nanahemaa never had any formal education, but she underwent a rigorous and quality informal education, learning a lot of things that were not taught in the classroom.
She was initiated and underwent puberty rites together with her niece, Nana Abena Ansa, in their early teens. She married Opanin Kwame Boateng, a blacksmith by profession from Aduman in Kumasi.
She was religious, kindhearted, calm, fair and firm, hardworking, very humble, unassuming, and accommodating. In the mid-1990s, Kwaku Firi Bosomfo, the priest of Kwaku Firi, prophesied through Baffour Akoto, a Senior Linguist of Asantehene, that Nanahemaa would be Queen of Asante someday, and surely, it came to pass.
Nanahemaa achieved a lot and has been recognised as such. Through her constant generosity in doing God’s work, the Saviour Church named a school after her, Nana Konadu Saviour School. She exhibited a high level of equity, justice, and fairness, and all cases brought before her have been settled amicably to the satisfaction of both parties involved.
In celebrating her 5th Anniversary as Asantehemaa, she made a huge donation to the mothers at the Mother-Baby Unit (MBU), Pediatric Emergency Care Unit (PICU), and Pediatric Emergency Unit (PEU), and paid for all the medical bills and expenses for new mothers at the Mother-Baby Unit (MBU) at Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital and Manhyia Government District Hospital.
Nanahemaa started a vigorous campaign and instituted an annual event to encourage mothers to breastfeed their young ones. The main reason she made a generous donation to the Mother-Baby Unit at Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital and Manhyia Government District Hospital.
During the commemoration of the 150th Anniversary of the Sagrenti War in a panel discussion on February 6, 2024, revelations emerged about the opposition faced by the decision to engage in war against the British, led by Sir Garnet Wolseley. Nana Afia Kobi, the Asantehemaa at that time, expressed reservations about the war, advising against it despite her son, Kofi Karikari, occupying the Golden Stool.
Discussing the role of women in Asante’s war and diplomacy, Professor Eugenia Anderson, a historian at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), recounted Afia Kobi’s stance.
On November 20, 1873, at an Asanteman Nhyiamu gathering, she reportedly said, “From olden times, it has been seen that God fights for Asante if war is just.
This one is unjust.”Despite her counsel, the decision of the military general prevailed, leading to the 1874 Sagrenti War, resulting in a significant defeat for the Asantes.
The aftermath saw the dethronement of Kofi Karikari and the ascent of Mensa Bonsu, another son of the Asantehemaa.Afia Kobi deemed the war against the British unjust, a sentiment supported by Prof. Samuel.
