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President Nana Akufo-Addo has announced his intention to build a state-of-the-art museum complex honoring the legacy of world-renowned black civil and intellectual rights pioneer Dr. WEB Du Drink.
“The museum will provide Ghana, another important monument to the collective struggle of African peoples to secure their rightful place in this world,” he said when signing a historic partnership agreement between the government of Ghana. and the WEB Du Bois. Museum Foundation in New York, Monday.
The ambitious project will also include a library and reading room, a reception hall, an outdoor auditorium and amphitheater, a conference space, a guest house for visiting researchers and the renovated bungalow where Dr Du Bois lived. and worked until his death.
The complex will also include a memorial pavilion housing the remains of Dr. Du Bois and the cremated ashes of his wife.
Du Bois, a civil rights pioneer and one of the world’s leading black intellectuals and thinkers, became a citizen of Ghana and resided in the country until his death in 1963.
The Du Bois Museum Complex aims to transform the Center and create a living museum that rekindles the transformative spirit and vision of Dr. Du Bois for a unified ancestral home for Africans in the Diaspora around the world.
The partnership, which was initiated by the president in 2019 as part of his trip to promote The Year of Return, will see the transformation of the current Du Bois Memorial Center and burial site in Accra into a state a world-class art museum complex and destination for academics and heritage tourists.
The partnership will see the Du Bois Museum Foundation Ghana lead the construction of a multi-million dollar museum complex to preserve Dr Du Bois’s legacy over a 50-year period.
The complex will be designed by renowned Ghanaian architect Sir David Adjaye and designer of the Smithsonian Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, DC.
When completed, the complex will serve as a historic memorial site, where visitors can honor its life and heritage, connect with their cultural and ancestral roots, and serve as a boost to inspire solidarity among people of African descent.
President Akufo-Addo, during the ceremony, stressed the importance of the agreement in strengthening the historical, cultural and economic ties between Ghana and the United States, and Africans in the Diaspora.
“This agreement will build on the government’s ‘Year of Return’ and ‘Beyond Return’ campaigns which encourage the return of the African diaspora from around the world.
He urged the African diaspora to follow in W. E Dubois’ footsteps by making Africa their home and contributing to the development of the continent.
The agreement was signed on behalf of the government of Ghana by Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta, Minister of Finance, and Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Awal, Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture.
Japhet Aryiku, executive director of the foundation in the United States, and Humphrey Ayim-Darke, board member of the WEB Du Bois Museum Foundation, Ghana, signed for the WEB Du Bois Museum Foundation.
Daniel Rose, President of the WEB Du Bois Museum Foundation, assured the President of his commitment to making Ghana a hub for Pan-African research and heritage tourism as he kicked off the ceremony.
Rose is a leading philanthropist and real estate developer with close ties to Ghana.
The Du Bois Memorial Center in Accra where Dr Du Bois and his wife, Shirley Graham Du Bois, are buried, opened to the public in 1985.
But in recent years has required additional care and maintenance.
The Foundation’s goal is to realize the full potential of the Du Bois Museum as an international treasure and historical memorial honoring one of the most important and revered black voices in world history.
Japhet Aryiku, Executive Director of the WEB Du Bois Museum Foundation, said: “The ‘Beyond the Year of Return’ campaign has promoted economic empowerment and encourages people from the diaspora to come to Africa to invest. , live and do more to uplift the continent.
Aryiku, a Ghanaian-American with over 40 years of experience in American business and the philanthropic community, was inspired from an early age by Du Bois’s writings and ideals.
Other speakers at the ceremony included Kwame Anthony Appiah, novelist and professor of philosophy and ethics at New York University and a member of the board of trustees of the WEB Du Bois Museum Foundation.
The guests were Mrs. Shirley Aryorkor Botchwey, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hajia Alima Mahama, Ambassador of Ghana to the United States, Akwasi Agyeman, CEO of the Ghana Tourism Authority and Humphrey Ayim-Darke of the Du Bois Museum Foundation, Ghana.
GNA
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