Of legacies and solutions “Five years on after death of KB Amissah-Arthur”

Death is a cruel thing! Five years on, it still makes one take stock, question their purpose and place in life, question their faith and indeed question the fundamental justice of life itself. 

There are many lessons to be learnt from life and one lesson that has become abundantly clear to some of us is with regard to the legacy you leave behind after death.

What is the point of life if it is not a life well lived or a life that has not left a legacy?

For several people, material legacies are what is important while for others, financial legacies matter.

Since the death of our father, we are now of the view that the legacy the dead person lives for those he or she left behind is all that matters.

That legacy, if appropriately nurtured, will blossom. It may be a legacy of diligence and hard work or a legacy of principles or faith.

Whatever the type of legacy, it is the fact that those left behind carry within them something of the person who died, particularly if that feature of the person is one to be admired.

Since the passing of our father, we have wondered what to do to honour a man we cherished and who created in us an unsurpassed legacy of mind and heart.

In a developing economy such as ours, several challenges, unfortunately, reduce the ability of the country to achieve its full potential.

Passionate

One of the things KB Amissah-Arthur was passionate about during his lifetime was enabling academics to come up with practical homegrown solutions to improve the economy and country as a whole.

He spent the formative years of his academic and technical career with the Economics Department of the University of Ghana.

KB Amissah-Arthur held a special and deep love for his department.

He not only taught economics, but he also practised it in government, in the private sector, at the central bank and indeed at home.

On numerous occasions when we were young, he made us aware of opportunity costs and the time value of money.

His heart was on improving the economy to advance human well-being and the fair distribution of the benefits of economic growth.

He was a people-centred economist who believed that a market-based economy must work for all, including ordinary people.

Given his passion for these things, we knew that whatever we did would have to incorporate the department and have a practical homegrown people-centred element about it.

Identifying problems and challenges is always easy, dare I say; everybody knows how to criticise!

The true test is identifying appropriate, fit-for-purpose solutions to the numerous problems and challenges we face as a country.

These solutions have to be based on data, facts, evidence and real hard science.

The solutions have to consider our socio-economic context and need to have the appropriate means of monitoring and evaluation.

Our father was a hardened believer in this country and felt that all these solutions could be found here within our own people.

How do we nurture the ability of technical people to solve problems and move to the point where there is homegrown acceptance and application of their ideas and solutions?

How do we encourage excellence devoid of bias within the academic community?

How do we create more people with solutions than people with criticisms?

Family

With all this in mind, the family of KB Amissah-Arthur have instituted two PhD awards at the Economics Department of the University of Ghana to deserving high-calibre students.

This award has been fully funded by the family in perpetuity.

We are also at the advanced stages of discussions with the Department of Economics to perpetually endow a chair of Economics at the University of Ghana.

This idea has received fantastic support and we are pleased to say we have had very positive pledges to fund the chair in perpetuity, pending the necessary University of Ghana regulatory procedures.

Funding a chair in perpetuity means that the Department of Economics will be able to attract and retain top talent of Professorial rank to give the occupant of the chair the ability to work towards finding practical applicable solutions to our challenges.

KB Amissah-Arthur’s belief and faith in the prowess of the technical intelligentsia is one of the reasons we feel that this is a worthwhile endeavour he would have supported.

It is our fervent wish that the legacy he left in us can be nurtured in those who will win the PhD award and in those who will occupy the chair.

The writer is the son
of Kwesi Bekoe.