A profile of courage and commitment

Ahmed I. Samatar, who has a doctorate from the University of Denver, US, is a University Dean . He is a prolific writer on African politics and other international issues. A James Wallace Professor and Dean of the Institute for Global Citizenship at Macalister College, US, Samatar is much in demand for lectures at top world varsities. (The name Samatar means the good-doer and of course, Ahmed is “we are grateful for having you”).He often speaks on global political economy, political and social theory; and African development. He has authored and edited five books; and more than 30 articles in the fields of his expertise. He is the founding editor-in-chief of Bildhaan, the first international journal of Somali studies, as well as being editor of the 19-volume Macalister International compendium - a publication for undergraduate education and internationalism. A Fulbright Fellow, he has been awarded grants by the Ford Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, and the US Institute for Peace, the Heinrich Boll Foundation and the St. Paul Foundation. His current research is a collaborative two-volume tome on leadership and the Somali experience. Sheeko senior editorial staff interviewed him in London recently on a broad range of subjects of topicality. Here is our report of the encounter with the distinguished Somali academic.

We arrive at his posh hotel in central London five minutes earlier than the appointed time. To our pleasant surprise he is gently sauntering in the lobby waiting for us. He turns around, sights us and gives us a broad smile; our Somali features give us away. As we exchange normal polite first words, we are struck by his manner of speaking. Actually, it is difficult to place his accent; not an inkling of BBC English – all has disappeared though he lived and worked for the broadcaster in London for many years. What you get now is a smooth hybrid of what we might call – for lack of a better description –Somali/American English, actually more American. He is pleasant, polished and cosmopolitan in all his approaches though as expected of an academic from the US, his small talk is still dotted with technical terms. Not necessary in the mode of “I am lactose intolerant” as some notorious Yankees would mystify, instead of simply saying “milk products harm me”, but rather somewhere in between – if you get the drift of what we are attempting to explain..