GhanaWeb has released its nominees for the real estate category of the GhanaWeb Excellence Awards 2025. Three profiles stand out — and each one tells you something useful about who is operating at the top end of Ghana’s property market right now.
Robert Owusu-Sekyere — VAAL Real Estate Ghana
Robert Owusu-Sekyere is Marketing Manager at VAAL Real Estate Ghana, one of the more active luxury developers in Accra. VAAL made considerable noise with the unveiling of AGORA — a 21-story luxury residential tower that signals how bullish certain developers remain on Accra’s premium segment, even as high-end vacancy remains a quiet problem in the market. VAAL also holds an IFC EDGE green certification for at least one project, The Greens Ghana, making them one of the few developers in the country with a credible sustainability credential to point to.
His nomination sits in the Real Estate Development category.
Joe Leslie Obeng-John — Cornerstone Developments
Joe Obeng-John is CEO and Managing Director of Cornerstone Developments, with over 12 years in the industry and a footprint across both Ghana and the UK through Cornerstone Invest (UK). The completed project list under his leadership is specific enough to be worth quoting: Nyla Court, Noble Square, Altitude, Aura. Then there are the now selling projects including: urum, AVA Residence and Nissi Place. All these projects span East Legon, Labone, Cantonments, and Airport Residential.
Seven named luxury projects in prime Accra locations is a meaningful track record for a Ghanaian developer. The UK connection makes Cornerstone a familiar name in diaspora buyer circles, which matters when a significant portion of the premium market is funded from abroad.
Dr Prince-Joseph Kofi Ayiku — Lakeside Estate Limited
Prince-Joseph Ayiku is Managing Director of Lakeside Estate Limited, a subsidiary of Japan Motors Trading Company. He came up through the finance side of the business before moving into the MD role, which tends to produce developers with a sharper eye on delivery costs and project viability than those who came up through sales. Lakeside sits in the mid-to-upper market and has been active in the Adjiringanor corridor.
Dr. Theresa Oppong-Beeko — Manet Group
Theresa Oppong-Beeko is the founder and president of Manet Group, and she has been building in Ghana since 1994 — which puts her track record ahead of most developers on this list by a decade or more. Manet Housing has delivered over 1,800 homes across multiple projects: Manet Court and Manet Ville in East Airport, Manet Palms in East Legon, Manet Paradise in Ada, and the Manet Twin Towers in Airport City, a $22 million commercial complex commissioned in 2010. The group also runs Manet Beach Paradise, a three-star resort at Ada, and Manet Construction, a civil engineering company.
She was a vocal critic of the STX Korea deal when it was announced in 2011, pointing out that private local developers had built the market for fifteen years without government support, and were now watching a foreign company get preferential land and financing to do the same work. The STX deal collapsed. The observation aged well.
Her nomination is in the Real Estate Development category. She is currently ranked as Ghana’s second richest woman, with an estimated net worth of $420 million.
Frank Oteng — Impel Properties
Frank Oteng is CEO and Managing Director of Impel Properties, alongside a cluster of other ventures — Impel Travels, Impel Cleaning, and Ghlagatin, a media company. Impel Properties is a property listing platform like Meqasa, but primarily listing lands for sale. He holds a degree in Interior Design and Upholstery from Accra Technical University, which gives him an eye for aesthetics that filters into how Impel Properties presents its work. He is also known as a media personality, which makes him a different profile from the other nominees — more entrepreneur-across-verticals than career developer.
His real estate track record is less publicly documented than the others on this list, and his nomination reflects an emerging presence in the sector rather than a decades-long portfolio. Worth watching; worth verifying before committing.
What The GhanaWeb Excellence Awards 2025 Tells You
All five nominees represent established operations with verifiable completed work and identifiable backers. That matters because Ghana’s real estate space still has a significant informal fringe — developers who announce projects, collect deposits, and then stall. Manet has 30 years of delivery and a commercial skyline presence in Airport City. Cornerstone’s seven-project portfolio is checkable. VAAL’s AGORA tower is visible on the Accra skyline. Lakeside has Japan Motors behind it. Impel Properties is the youngest name here, and the one that warrants the most independent verification before any financial commitment.
None of this is a guarantee. But it is the kind of signal worth paying attention to when you are deciding who to trust with a serious financial commitment. Before engaging any developer in Ghana — nominated for awards or not — verify their completed work, check registration with the Real Estate Agency Council, and do a title search through the Lands Commission on any property they offer.
Voting for the GhanaWeb Excellence Awards is open to the public at ghanaweb.com.
