Friends, our hearts are heavy at NIMC as we recently, and unexpectedly, lost a beloved member of the NIMC family. Edmund Kwame Botchway, known to his friends and colleagues as Kwame, was taken from us far too soon, though the warmth of his spirit and the ripples of his tenacious commitment to social justice will endure in perpetuity through all that he touched.
Those who know some of Kwame’s story are well aware that he squeezed several lifetimes of global experience and impact into his thirty-three year journey. Born in the small Ghanaian village of Keta, raised by his grandmother, our dear philosopher-poet-activist-social entrepreneur soared to marvelous heights through constant force of will and ingenuity. From his humble beginnings in rural Ghana, his journey led him to a seat among global leaders at the World Economic Forum in Geneva, Switzerland. Check out his panel remarks to see a man who was born to sound a captivating clarion call for justice at all levels of society.
I met Kwame while on sabbatical at the University of Ghana in Accra. I soon fell under the spell of his persistence and charm as this departmental research assistant with global aspirations impressed me with his single-minded focus to pursue graduate studies in our Community Practice for Social Change program at the Mandel School. For someone who had never left the country, he had an incredibly expansive and worldly sense of his activist destiny. What a joy to be able to help steward his journey to the US and his launch into his local and global impact roles.
One highlight of our time working together was the co-authoring of his first scholarly publication, an article with cautions and recommendations for the next phase of urban development in Accra.
He recently shared some reflections on his time interning at NIMC during our 10 th anniversary NIMC Family Reunion, stating:
“I appreciate the level of trust that NIMC placed in me, even as a first-year student, to do the work and to have the opportunity to learn in real-time and build my leadership skill sets. In the consulting work I do now, I feel like some of those early sparks started from that work I did at NIMC gave me the confidence to venture out and feel like I can actually do this.”
He went on to describe his current approach to his work and ways in which his time with us had influenced him:
“A methodology has been baked into the way I think and work, a frame of thinking that NIMC has equipped me with — any room that I am walking into, whether it’s at the grassroots community level or in the boardroom — I’m always asking the question: What are the levers of change that need to be pulled in this room to drive the real systemic and structural change that we want to see? I’m constantly looking for new ways to contribute to different facets of society. In each of those, the primary question I ask myself is how can we have long lasting systemic change in this area of my work?”
We wistfully but proudly commit to carrying on Kwame’s legacy of bold engagement at all levels of society and of always seeking to ultimately foster durable systemic change. Rest in peace, our beloved Black Star. You will be dearly missed and never forgotten.
Contributions are welcome to a memorial fund which is helping cover funeral services and other costs as well as travel for family members from Ghana and the UK.