WORDS THAT WILL LIVE A HUNDRED YEARS: AN OBITUARY TO REMEMBER BY DR. RK DAU

OBITUARY

PROFESSOR KEN EDWARDS (1945 - 2009): The way I knew him

Ramadhani K Dau

It was at 1.11pm of Wednesday March 18, 2009 when I switched on my cell phone [it was switched off since the previous night] I received a brief but very chilling sms from Prof. Joshua Nkhululi’s wife that stated: “mimi mke wa Prof. Ken Edwards, mzee amefariki leo saa 2 asubuhi. Asante”; literally translated as “I am the wife of Prof. Ken Edwards, the old man passed away today at 8am. Thanks”.

Upon reading the sms, my initial reaction was that of self denial. I said to myself I must be dreaming especially considering the fact that I had spoken to him over the phone only the previous Monday. Then I got what I had thought was a brilliant idea. I told myself that “you didn’t read the sms carefully. It referred to mzee [an old man] who is dead, not Ken Edwards. After all, by any standards, at 64, Ken cannot be described as mzee. So I picked some courage and decided to call Professor’s good wife hoping to hear that the mzee being referred to in her sms was their next door neighbour. This was not to be. The mzee was none other than our own good old friend Prof. Joshua Naphtali Nkhululi! Naturally, I was devastated at the news of his death just like many thousands of his friends and students around the world as evidenced by the obituaries and the number of postings in the TANZANET and other blogs.

Writing an obituary for a man like Ken has not been easy partly because I have never in my life written an obituary before; but also because Ken was a man of exceptional qualities. He was a serious academic, a motivator, a workaholic, a very generous person, a selfless person who puts the interest of others first even at the expense of personal discomfort and sacrifice. So who is Ken Edwards?  This is a question which is at the tip of the tongue of many readers.

Prof. Joshua Nkhululi [former Kenneth L. Edwards but fondly known by many as Ken] was born in Jamaica in 1945. He received his tertiary education in the US where he earned his Master of Business Administration [MBA] from prestigious Stanford Business School, a University that belonged to the Ivy League. He came to Tanzania in 1970s where he was employed as a Lecturer in the Faculty of Arts and Social Science-department of Management and Administration. In 1979, Ken almost single handed transformed the department of Management and Administration into a fully fledged Faculty of Commerce and Management [FCM] and he became the first Dean.

I first met Ken in July 1979, when I joined the Faculty of Commerce as a B.Com student. In spite of his busy administrative work as the Dean of a young Faculty, Ken decided to take some classes because by then the Faculty did not have enough Lecturers. He taught us AC 100, i.e., Principles of Accounting. For those who were in B.Com class of 1979 would remember very well Ken’s famous definition of Accounting. He defined Accounting as “a language of business expressed in monetary terms”. He would then end with the words “Simple! Simple! Simple!” Those last words very inspirational. They made most of us believe that Accounting is simple.

In some measure, Ken was very instrumental in career development of many senior officers in the Government and State Owned Enterprises.  These include the current author. Perhaps it was Ken more than anybody else who, upon completion of my B.Com degree, persuaded me to stay at the “Hill” and teach. Graduating with B.Com marketing, my ambition and those of my colleagues was to work as a Marketing Manager at one of the many State Owned Enterprises such as BIT Group of Companies like BHESCO, AISCO, NAPCO, HOSCO, DABCO, RTC etc.

I still vividly remember the day when I met Ken outside his office at the Tower Block when he asked me about my future plans after graduation. Without hesitation, I told him that I will request the Higher Level Manpower Allocation Committee to post me to one of BIT Group of Companies. To this, Ken reacted by saying “no man! You are not going anywhere. You must stay and help to build the Faculty”. In the ensuing 30 minutes of discussions I tried to convince him on how helpful I will be to the nation if I worked as a Marketing Manager somewhere. Certainly he was not impressed. He even threatened to block my posting to any institution other than the University of Dar es Salaam as a Teaching Assistant in his Faculty. The rest is history.

Ken will be remembered by many for his dedication to work. He transformed a young Faculty of Commerce and Management into a very strong and respectable Faculty at the “Hill” through hard work.  As a Teaching Assistant, I witnessed many times when Ken worked tirelessly to search for scholarships for his new members of the Faculty. As a testimony to his hard working habits, even at a time when he was bed ridden for almost 3 months, Ken was writing a proposal for establishing a Pan Africa University of Management in Arusha. Many will remember that it was Ken who conceived the idea of establishing the Institute of Accounting Arusha [IAA]. He was also heavily involved in the setting up of East and Southern Africa Management Institute [ESAMI] in Arusha. He was also responsible for establishing an Executive Development Program [EDP] at the Faculty of Commerce whereby all senior Government officials including the Permanent Secretaries were required to attend Management training regularly.

Whilst we remember Ken for his outstanding contribution to our Nation, we should not lose sight to one fact. The painful fact is that for all that he gave for this Nation, Ken died as a poor man. During the struggle for liberating Southern African countries, Ken was the Chairperson of the Liberation Committee at the University of Dar es Salaam.  Through his position, he became very close to many African leaders and freedom fighters. In spite of his extensive connections, Ken never took advantage of his personal relationship for personal gain. He never acted as an “agent” between investors and the newly liberated countries in exchange for commissions or favours. He never used his connections to request for jobs as a Consultant to these Governments. Instead, he semi-retired in Maasai land and continued with his work as a teacher.

It is sad to note that Ken had been ill for about 3 months. During this time, he could hardly afford medication. I remember to have spoken to him several times and suggested that he should go to India for treatment. His reply was simple: He could not afford a return air ticket to India leave alone the costs of medication! I later learned from his wife that he did not even have traveling documents for many years because he had discarded his Jamaican’s passport and his application for Tanzanian citizenship was turned down. To this end, an attempt by his wife and friends to take him to Nairobi for treatment failed.

All said about Ken, the big question is: What is the best way to remember this great man who has done a lot for this country? I would like to echo the suggestions by Dr Assad, who, in his obituary proposed among others, establishment of Prof. Ken Edwards Chair of Accounting and Finance. I am sure institutions such as Tanzania Revenue Authority [which benefitted enormously from FCM] should be able to sponsor the Chair for at least the first 5 years.  

To his family, all I can say is that they should take solace to the fact that Ken has done a lot of good to this country and there are many people out there who appreciate his contribution.

To fellow Tanzanians, if the laws of the country allow, I suggest we honour this great man’s selfless contribution to our Nation by granting him his Tanzanian citizenship, albeit posthumously.

Dr Ramadhani K Dau is the Director General of National Social Security Fund, Tanzania and former Lecturer in the Department of Marketing, Faculty of Commerce and Management, at the University of Dar es Salaam