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Kofi Annan

Kofi Atta Annan (/ˈkoʊfi ˈænæn/ KOH-fee AN-an;[1] 8 April 1938 – 18 August 2018) was a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006.[2] Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize.[3] He was the founder and chairman of the Kofi Annan Foundation, as well as chairman of The Elders, an international organisation founded by Nelson Mandela.[4]

Busumuru
Kofi Annan

Boutros Boutros-Ghali

Ban Ki-moon

Position established

Lakhdar Brahimi

Boutros Boutros-Ghali

Marrack Goulding

Bernard Miyet

Emmanuel Noi Omaboe

Mary Chinery-Hesse

(1938-04-08)8 April 1938
Kumasi, Colony of the Gold Coast (now Ghana)

18 August 2018(2018-08-18) (aged 80)
Bern, Switzerland

Titi Alakija
​
​
(m. 1965; div. 1983)​
Nane Lagergren
​
​
(m. 1984)​

3, including Kojo

  • Diplomat
  • economist

Foundation

Annan joined the United Nations in 1962, working for the World Health Organization's Geneva office. He went on to work in several capacities at the UN Headquarters, including serving as the Under-Secretary-General for peacekeeping between March 1992 and December 1996. He was appointed secretary-general on 13 December 1996 by the Security Council and later confirmed by the General Assembly, making him the first officeholder to be elected from the UN staff itself. He was re-elected for a second term in 2001 and was succeeded as secretary-general by Ban Ki-moon in 2007.


As secretary-general, Annan reformed the UN bureaucracy, worked to combat HIV/AIDS (especially in Africa) and launched the UN Global Compact. He was criticised for not expanding the Security Council and faced calls for his resignation after an investigation into the Oil-for-Food Programme, but was largely exonerated of personal corruption.[5] After the end of his term as secretary-general, he founded the Kofi Annan Foundation in 2007 to work on international development. In 2012, Annan was the UN–Arab League Joint Special Representative for Syria to help find a resolution to the ongoing conflict there.[6][7] Annan quit after becoming frustrated with the UN's lack of progress with regards to conflict resolution.[8][9] In September 2016, Annan was appointed to lead a UN commission to investigate the Rohingya crisis.[10] He died in 2018 and was given a state funeral.

Early life and education[edit]

Kofi Annan was born in Kumasi in the Gold Coast (now Ghana) on 8 April 1938.[11] His twin sister Efua Atta, who died in 1991, shared the middle name Atta, which in the Akan language means "twin".[12] Annan and his sister were born into one of the country's Fante aristocratic families; both of their grandfathers and their uncle were Fante paramount chiefs,[13] and their brother Kobina would go on to become Ghana's ambassador to Morocco.[14]


In the Akan names tradition, some children are named according to the day of the week they were born, sometimes in relation to how many children precede them. Kofi in Akan is the name that corresponds with Friday, the day on which Annan was born.[15] The last name Annan in Fante means fourth-born child. Annan said that his surname rhymes with "cannon" in English.[16]


From 1954 to 1957, Annan attended the elite Mfantsipim, an all-boys Methodist boarding school in Cape Coast founded in the 1870s. Annan said that the school taught him that "suffering anywhere, concerns people everywhere".[17] In 1957, the year Annan graduated from Mfantsipim, the Gold Coast gained independence from the UK and began using the name "Ghana".


In 1958, Annan began studying economics at the Kumasi College of Science and Technology, now the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology of Ghana. He received a Ford Foundation grant, enabling him to complete his undergraduate studies in economics at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota, US, in 1961. Annan then completed a diplôme d'études approfondies DEA degree in International Relations at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland, from 1961 to 1962. After some years of work experience, he studied at the MIT Sloan School of Management[18] (1971–72) in the Sloan Fellows program and earned a master's degree in management.


Annan was fluent in English, French, Akan, and some Kru languages as well as other African languages.[19]

member of the board of directors (2008–2018)[126]

United Nations Foundation

chancellor (2008–2018)[127]

University of Ghana

School of International and Public Affairs of , global fellow (2009–2018)[128]

Columbia University

The Committee on Global Thought at , fellow[129]

Columbia University

at the National University of Singapore (NUS), Li Ka Shing Professor (2009–2018)[130]

Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy

member of the board of directors (2010–2018)[131][132]

Global Centre for Pluralism

Prize for Achievement in African Leadership, chairman of the prize committee (2007–2018)[133]

Mo Ibrahim

(AGRA), chairman (2007–2018)[134]

Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa

founder and president (2007–2018)[135]

Global Humanitarian Forum

founding commissioner.[136] The commission had declared in a 2011 report that the war on drugs was a failure.[137] Annan believed that, since drug use represents a health risk, it should be regulated, comparing it to the regulation of tobacco which reduced smoking in many countries.[138]

Global Commission on Drug Policy

Personal life[edit]

In 1965, Annan married Titi Alakija, a Nigerian woman from an aristocratic family. Several years later, they had a daughter, Ama, and a son, Kojo. The couple separated in the late 1970s,[152] and divorced in 1983.[12]


In 1984, Annan married Nane Lagergren, a Swedish lawyer at the UN and a maternal half-niece of diplomat Raoul Wallenberg.[153] She has a daughter, Nina, from a previous marriage.[154]


In 2002, Annan was enstooled by Otumfuo Nana Osei Tutu II, the Asantehene of Asanteman, as the Busumuru of the Ashanti people - a Ghanaian chief. He was the first person to hold this title.[155][156]

Death and state funeral[edit]

Annan died on the morning of 18 August 2018 in Bern, Switzerland, at the age of 80, after a short illness.[157][158] António Guterres, the UN secretary-general, said that Annan was "a global champion for peace" and "a guiding force for good".[159][157] Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad also said he is saddened by the death of Annan.[160] His body was returned to his native Ghana from Geneva in a brief and solemn ceremony at the Kotoka International Airport in Accra, on 10 September.[161] His coffin, draped in the blue UN flag, was accompanied by his widow Nane, his children and senior diplomats from the international organisation.[161][162]


On 13 September, a state funeral was held for Annan in Ghana at the Accra International Conference Centre.[163] The ceremony was attended by several political leaders from across Africa as well as Ghanaian traditional rulers, European royalty and dignitaries from the international community, including the UN secretary-general António Guterres.[164] Prior to the funeral service, his body lay in state in the foyer of the same venue, from 11 to 12 September.[165] A private burial followed the funeral service at the new Military Cemetery at Burma Camp, with full military honours and the sounding of the Last Post by army buglers and a 17-gun salute.[166][167][168][169]

Memorials and legacy[edit]

The United Nations Postal Administration released a new stamp in memory of Annan on 31 May 2019.[170] His portrait on the stamp was designed by artist Martin Mörck.[170] The Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre and the Ghana-India Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence in ICT, both in Accra, are named in his honour. The Kofi Annan University of Guinea is named after him.

List of black Nobel laureates

Kofi Annan Foundation

Archived 4 October 2018 at the Wayback Machine at the United Nations Archives

Kofi Annan papers

on Nobelprize.org (including Nobel Lecture, 10 December 2001)

Kofi Annan

Speeches


Lectures