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| Prof. Ali Mazrui katika Barza Nile Hilton Kampala 2003 |
This book memorializing the life and work
of Ali Al’amin Mazrui comprises more than 130 tributes written by people
ranging from heads of state to journalists. Presented here are those tributes
for which copyright permissions were received from among the hundreds that
appeared online and in print. In preparing this book, it was made very
clear that, unlike other books of tributes to great men and women, there would
be no segmentation of the sections based on writers’ and speakers’ positions in
life. Instead, it was decided that the tributes be presented in
alphabetical order based on writers’ and speakers’ last names. The
decision hinged on the fact that Mazrui would not have approved any
segmentation of people by class, race, ethnicity, gender, religion, country of
origin, etc. Nonetheless, out of great respect for Mazrui’s immediate
family members, their tributes are presented first, followed by those from his
global family members. Also included at the beginning of the book are
three chapters that comprise an introductory essay, a brief biography of
Mazrui, and an essay on metaphorical-linguistic analysis of the tributes that
follow. The book also has a preface by the coeditors and a foreword by
Salim Ahmed Salim, the former Prime Minister of the United Republic of Tanzania
and Secretary-General of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), now known as
the African Union. Dr. Salim, who served as the Secretary-General of the
OAU from 1989 to 2001, was Mazrui’s friend and contemporary. Mazrui
once described Salim as “Mr. Africa” and the “first real postcolonial
Secretary-General of the OAU.”
· Seifudein
Adem is an academic and the longest-serving Associate Director of the
Institute of Global Cultural Studies, which was founded by Ali A. Mazrui in
1991 at Binghamton University, New York. By invitation, Dr. Adem has
written special tributes to Ali Mazrui for several periodicals
including Third World Quarterly (London, UK), CODESRIA
Bulletin (Dakar, Senegal), and Transition Magazine (Harvard
University, USA). Seifudein Adem was also honored to accompany Mazrui’s
body to its final resting place in Mombasa, Kenya.
· Jideofor
Adibe is Associate Professor of Political Science at Nasarawa State
University Keffi, Nigeria. Dr. Adibe’s London-based publishing company, Adonis
& Abbey Publishers (www.adonis-abbey.com) is one of Mazrui’s European publishers.
· Abdul
Karim Bangura is a researcher-in-residence of Abrahamic Connections and
Islamic Peace Studies at the Center for Global Peace at American University and
Professor of Research Methodology and Public Policy at Howard University,
Washington, DC. A holder of five doctorate degrees, Dr. Bangura has
published more than 75 books and 100s of articles, including on Ali Mazrui’s
scholarship.
· Abdul
Samed Bemath is a South African based Library Consultant and the compiler
of three annotated bibliographies of Ali Mazrui's writings covering the period
1962-2015. Mr. Bemath is also the coeditor of Mazrui’s collected
essays, The Politics of War and the Culture of Violence (2008).
***
Below are memories of Prof. Ali Mazrui from one of his distant students:
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