How William Ofori-Atta influenced Tsatsu Tsikata into becoming a lawyer

• One of such mentors is Paa Willie

• He indicated that Paa Willie visits his room anytime he is on campus to speak to the Christian Fellowship

Tsatsu Tsikata says his life as a ‘legal luminary’ was influenced by William Ofori-Atta popularly known as Paa Willie, one of the members of the ‘Big Six’.

According to him, he was blessed at every stage of his life by great mentors who showed him the best side of life and his legal practice.

Recounting his encounter with the great politician on Citi TV monitored by GhanaWeb, Tsatsu Tsikata said, whilst at the Christian Fellowship at the University of Ghana, Paa Willie will be invited to speak to the congregation.

“He had then come out of prison where he had become a Christian. He was always amazing because he was this person, one of the Big Six, and he always speaks simply and so lightly. He was known to be a big orator but when you are in his presence, he brought things down to the level of us young ones.

The way he talked about living his time in prison and so on, left its mark on me. By the time I was having my own experience some forty-something years later, it was a déjà vu.”

Tsatsu Tsikata indicated that after Paa Willie finished preaching to them at the fellowship, he would walk with him to his room at the Legon Hall to have conversations with him and his roommate, Duke Danquah, who is Paa Willie’s nephew.

He recounted further, “But Paa Willie actually used to go further, not only actually talk to the Christian Fellowship, we became close personally, but after his talk, he will sometimes just walk with me to my room and at that time, he had an extra reason for coming to my room, my roommate was Duke Danquah, his nephew, thus JB Danquah’s son; and so Paa Willie [as great as he was] brought himself to the level of us young ones.

He related to us as if we were just his younger brothers. He was a lawyer also and that gave me some insights into what it means to be a lawyer. In the long run, I ended up representing him in court in the 70s. I represented him as a junior to Joe Reindorf…”

“That was an extraordinary privilege because each day that we were in court, Paa Willie would have some stories that he would tell and it was always remarkable…it was a privilege indeed,” Tsatsu Tsikata stressed.