UNESCO - United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

09/24/2024 | News release | Distributed by Public on 09/25/2024 10:29

UNESCO pays tribute to Amadou Mahtar M’bow (1921 – 2024)

A profound humanist and all-round intellectual, Amadou Mahtar M'Bow left a lasting impression on our institution by forcefully defending the need for solidarity and equal dignity between peoples and cultures. Throughout the independence movements, he also strove to ensure that every State found its rightful place at UNESCO, giving substance and reality to the ambition of multilateralism.

Audrey AzoulayUNESCO Director-General

Audrey Azoulay extended her condolences to "his family, his friends, and the many at UNESCO and elsewhere, who saw in him a model for both thought and action."

Born in Dakar in 1921, Ahmadou Mahtar M'Bow first attended a colonial school and then a Koranic school. He was active in Senegalese politics and was appointed the Minister for Education and Culture (1957-1958.) He resigned to join the fight for independence. Once Senegal gained independence, he became Minister of National Education (1966-1968), then of Culture and Youth (1968-1970) and a member of the National Assembly. He was named Under-Director General of UNESCO for Education in 1970 and elected Director General in 1974.

Election of the Director-General of UNESCO during the General Conference, Paris, 15 November 1974. Amadou Mahtar M'Bow of Senegal became the first African to head a United Nations agency. This film was made for the 1976 General Conference, held in Nairobi. (in French)
© UNESCO

The path that led the small farmer from the African Sahel to the head of one of the United Nations' most prestigious organizations is representative of the emergence of a world that had long been subjugated, despised, or even ignored: that of the dispossessed.

Pierre Kalfon of Mr. M'Bow's election as Director-General of UNESCOJournalist

During his 13-year tenure, Mr. M'Bow oversaw some of the UNESCO projects that would become known as part of the organization's core work.

1982 Mr. Amadou-Mahtar M'Bow Director-General of UNESCO lays the foundation stone of the future national museum of Egyptian civilization in Guezira.
© UNESCO
Mr. Amadou Mahtar M'Bow takes part in the ceremony marking the end of the international campaign for saving the monuments of Nubia.
© UNESCO

He oversaw the secretariat's work for the World Heritage Convention and received the first ratifications that meant the Convention could enter into force. He oversaw the compilation of the first sites on the World Heritage List in 1978.

Listen to the oral Archives of the World Heritage Convention

Interview with Amadou-Mahtar M'Bow. 22 October 2009, Paris, France

Mr. M'Bow also launched the General History of Africa, which attempts to remedy the ignorance about Africa's past. The General History of Africa (GHA) is a pioneering corpus, that no longer leaves the pre-colonial period in the shadows and that deeply integrates the destiny of Africa into that of humanity by highlighting its relations with the other continents and the contribution of African cultures to the general progress of humanity.

We owe to him the monumental scientific work that is the General History of Africa, which gave the world, and more specifically Africans, a means of appropriating their own history and facing the future with confidence.

Audrey Azoulayhighlighting this specific work
H.E. M. Léopold Sedar Senghor, Président of Senegal with M. Amadou-Mahtar M'Bow, Director General of UNESCO.
© UNESCO

During his term, Amadou Mahtar M'Bow launched a famous appeal to the international communityfor he restitution of an irreplaceable cultural heritage to those who created it, leading to the creation of the Intergovernmental Committee for promoting the return of cultural property to its countries of origin or its restitution in case of illicit appropriationwas also established.

The men and women of these countries have the right to recover these cultural assets which are part of their being.

Amadou-Mahtar M'BowFormer Director-General of UNESCO

He also presided over the designation of thefirst biospheres. During this period, UNESCO recognized protected areas as model regions that balanced conservation of biodiversity and sustainable development.

Amadou Mahtar M'Bow also argued forcefully in favour of a "New World Order of Information and Communication" - since at the time international news was provided exclusively by five major press agencies, all based in Europe and North America, with the resulting news flowing essentially from North to South.This work led to the launch of long-lasting initiatives such as the International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC)created in 1981

Amadou-Mahtar M'Bow is the author of numerous publications, including several on UNESCO's missions, in particular Aux sources du futur : La problématique mondiale et les missions de l'UNESCO(L'Harmattan, 2011). He has also contributed to the publications of the Académie du Royaume du Maroc through some thirty papers dealing with major cultural, political, economic and social problems of the world, often from an African perspective. In a special edition of the UNESCO Courier, the Director General wrote a series of articles, calling for "a greater need than ever for tolerance and understanding".

The celebrations of his 100th anniversary in 2021 were an opportunity to look back on his achievements and to recall the depth of his message today, at a special ceremony organized at UNESCO headquarters.

Official visit of Pope John Paul II to UNESCO in 1980.
© UNESCO

During his career, Mr. M'Bow expressed his "deep conviction that the world is one and that the fight for humanity is the same everywhere". A fierce advocate against of all forms of racism or discrimination and a strong opponent to the Apartheid, his legacy shows this deep commitment to equality and culture for everyone to share.

Speech by the Director-General of UNESCO, 20 February 1979, as part of International Year for the Fight against Apartheid. (in French)
© UNESCO