When African Presidential Archives and Research Center director Charles Stith first brought the idea of bringing a former African president to Boston University to former BU president Jon Westling, it was merely a big idea, not unlike many the former United States ambassador to Tanzania had thought up for the center throughout its planning months.

Now, less than two years after it was established at BU, the center is completing a year of hosting former Zambian president Kenneth Kaunda.

It’s been a success even though Stith said he was never sure his plan would actually come to fruition.

‘What we had before President Kaunda’s appointment was a good solid idea,’ Stith said in an interview this week. ‘With his coming, and with what he represents both in terms of standing and stature on the continent … he has enabled us to have an impact that is exponentially great.’

Kaunda has spent the year touring Boston and the United States, giving speeches and urging Americans to think and care about a continent APARC officials say goes forgotten far too often in world affairs. He has made numerous trips across the state and country, representing BU in many of the country’s top foreign policy circles and describing Africa’s greatest problems to American audiences of all sorts from Princeton University to the University of Florida.

Africa’s main problems, according to Kaunda, are the AIDS epidemic that has ravaged the continent since the early 1990s which Kaunda works on combating outside the APARC program and the continent’s widespread and serious poverty.

He has also spoken out about the proposed use of genetically modified foods to solve some of the continent’s problems with hunger and poverty, instead suggesting organic crops as a long-term solution.

To BU audiences, Kaunda has urged that America fight terror by helping lift people out of poverty throughout the world, rather than attacking known violent combatants. During a speech this month, he said Americans have been too focused on superficial responses to terror, telling them America should instead reach out and attack the root of the problems.

But most of his speeches during his months in America have followed one relatively simple theme Africa is a continent with serious problems, and the world’s superpower needs to help.

Kaunda said when he originally came in September, the purpose of the visit was to get the African perspective on world problems out to Americans, telling them about the continent’s struggles.

‘It is a duty in Africa to come and tell you people as a superpower where you are able to listen,’ Kaunda said in an interview last week. ‘We must tell you how we see things, and if you agree with us, wonderful.’

When Kaunda’s appointment to the program was originally announced last August, a number of people expressed opposition to the idea, saying BU should not be giving African leaders with poor human rights and democratic track records such credence. But Stith said the reaction, and some peoples’ lack of openness toward the idea, showed that people did not really know what the APARC was trying to do.

‘My reaction then, quite frankly, was that the criticisms raised punctuated the necessity for this program,’ Stith said. ‘There was a lack of information about who Kaunda was and a lack of understanding of his place in history, both on the continent and generally. It reflected a cavalier attitude toward an understanding of Africa.’

The first year of the program, and Kaunda’s contributions to America’s dialogue on Africa, answered those questions, Stith said.

After the program began, ‘you started to see a more sophisticated kind of coverage,’ Stith said.

A NEW LOOK AT AMERICA

Kaunda said the most valuable part of the program for him was getting the chance to meet real Americans. Though he had met pretty much every American president since he led Zambia to independence in the early 1960s, he never got the opportunity to meet real Americans, he said.

‘This one year has given me a real opportunity,’ Kaunda said. ‘I’ve gone out to universities, colleges, churches the people and I find them wonderful people. So it is a success, you’d have to say.

‘This program has given me a very good opportunity to understand something about the humanist character of the American people,’ he said.

But Stith said that more than offering Kaunda the opportunity to meet Americans, the program has given Americans a taste of a continent many in the country ignore and given BU a front-row seat on that education.

‘His efforts represent a unique contribution that can only be made when you have someone of his stature involved,’ Stith said. ‘His broad view of history and where the continent is going makes him a unique resource.’

Not only that, Stith said, but his presence and affiliation with BU only helped the university. Over the past year, BU has been put ‘at the epicenter of discussion about Africa and where it is right now.’

‘There’s not another student at another university in this country that’s got access to the fund of knowledge in the kind of intimate way that having a president-in-residence provides,’ Stith said.

BU provost Dennis Berkey also said Kaunda’s contributions to the university have been significant, pointing to the APARC-organized former African leaders’ summit, which convened last week.

‘These activities have drawn much attention to this new program and to the university generally,’ Berkey said in an email.

Because Kaunda has also helped out with BU’s already-established African Studies Center, he has only added to BU and made the program stronger, both Stith and Berkey said.

‘The program and the APARC generally have strengthened the university’s already distinguished reputation as a major center for the study of Africa,’ Berkey said.

FEW CHANGES FOR NEXT YEAR

Stith said though there are aspects of the APARC’s program he would like to improve generally, the president-in-residence program will likely not change much for next year. Any changes will likely be operational, rather than related to the program’s actual substance, he said.

The APARC has yet to select a new president-in-residence, and Stith said serious discussions about that subject have yet to happen. But Stith said this year, the question is less about whether BU will host another former African leader and more about who the program will select.

‘We will do our own due diligence, and at the end of the day, that’s what it boils down to,’ he said. ‘With having someone who’s actually done it, now it’s a less theoretical decision.’

Stith said one thing this year has shown is the need to keep looking at big ideas. Last week’s former African leaders forum, which drew six former heads of state to the BU campus, is one example of a program the center may consider making an annual event.

He also said the center might look at drawing other Africa experts, including former government ministers from some of the continent’s countries.