On Friday 6 October 2017 ILRI lost a valued staff member and a splendid colleague and friend to many. Emaelaf Kebede lost a battle with a serious illness that day, dying with so much more to offer the world.

Emaelaf was a man with a ready smile and a warm embrace. He was always curious about people and life, always there to help with a friendly word, or just to listen to others. A solid, dependable, upright colleague, he never sought the limelight but rather took on professional challenges with uncommon dignity and grace as well as talent. He was a fair and good-humoured man who genuinely cared about people and about doing the right thing. Quiet and diligent, he was a virtual ‘rock’ at ILRI, always standing for ILRI and its mission to relieve world poverty and hunger as well as for its many individual staff members.
Emaelaf was a proud father, always doing his utmost to give his two sons a bright future. He kept his struggles with his illness private, not wishing to impose his ordeal on others. Maybe he wished for people to remember him as he had been, in his prime. For his colleagues at ILRI, he succeeded. We’ll remember a man who never failed each morning to ask us about our own health, disregarding his own failing health.

Remembering that, honouring that, extraordinary generosity gives us daily pause, a daily opportunity to cherish the little kindness and other traits that made him so special.

Emaelaf is badly missed at ILRI. Never forgotten.