**1. Introduction**

Ghanaian leaders are likely to adopt a paternalistic leadership style, influenced by the traditional rule system where the chief is seen as the father of the community [1]. Asiedu-Appiah et al. [1] argue that Ghanaian leaders in a work organisation are also expected to make decisions that will benefit the organisation and employees without involving them in decision-making. Overall, their study's findings suggest that influential leaders were achievement and results-oriented, focused, committed, courageous, hardworking, and have integrity. While their study investigated leadership broadly, the results have implications for leadership in the Ghanaian educational sector.

Effective leaders are needed to manage vocational-technical educational institutions in Ghana as the government plans to raise its workforce's skill level [2]. Leadership styles would be a prominent feature of any educational institution that intends to ensure enhanced productivity and efficiency in its service delivery. The leadership of the Polytechnic predominantly exhibited autocratic and democratic (participative) leadership characteristics [3]. Yahaya et al. [3] further reports that leaders who exhibited democratic (participative), people-oriented or transformational leadership characteristics enhanced staff productivity. The study concluded that the leadership of the Polytechnic were either autocratic or democratic in its leadership approach.

While the works of [2, 3] seem to give preliminary evidence of the need for good leadership in Ghana's educational sector, there seems to be a certain lack of awareness among educational managers on the styles that produce results within the Ghanaian educational system. For instance, [4] reports that unless headteachers are well equipped with leadership knowledge and skills, they would not know if they have any influence on their schools and academic work. The study also established that even though respondents agreed that a leadership style could affect academic performance, the headteachers do not gain the confidence of the stakeholders enough to build terms that can enhance the quality of teaching and learning.

Inferring from the work of [4], the leader directs the progress of every organisation. This is found true in the work of [5] that leaders should know any action to improve subordinate commitment and job performance should take into account appropriate leadership behaviour. Also, human development training should be instituted to shape the enterprise's present and future leadership needs.

While these studies on leadership and its styles are specifically aimed at university managers, it does appear that, within the Ghanaian educational system, there seem to be minimal studies on the leadership styles relative to the student unions and their leadership. This deficit in the leadership literature precludes educational stakeholders from holistically accessing, in broader terms, the leadership styles adopted by the educational system in Ghana since that will be bereft of the inputs of students' leadership. This study fills this gap by interrogating the leadership styles adopted by student leaders in a public university in Ghana.

The significance of this study is that it would contribute to the existing literature on leadership styles adopted in the Ghanaian educational system from the lenses of students. It is also significant that we will be able to establish whether the styles adopted are effective or otherwise in achieving the desired outcomes for students within the Ghanaian educational sector. The study is further significant in that it introduces readers to studies on university governance from student leadership perspectives.
