Mali’s Prime Minister came to visit (2006)

We organized a wonderful Mali exhibit at the Richmond Public Library in Virginia, and we invited the new Mali Ambassador to open the exhibit. Ambassador Abdoulaye DIOP was delighted …. And delightful. We have become firm friends and we share a lot of ideas. Later he became Mali’s Foreign Minister.

Diop called me: “Can I bring the Prime Minister to meet 3rd Grade kids who are learning about Mali?”

Of course he could: and after lunch for 30 at the Jefferson Hotel and photos with Thomas Jefferson in the Palm Court, Prime Minister Ousmane Issoufi Maiga visited the J.B.Fisher school, before delivering a speech to students at Virginia Commonwealth University. Here we are at the Q&A session, with (from left to right) Robin Poulton (translator); the Prime Minister; Prof Peter Kirkpatrick from the French Department; Jessica Lee, VP of the VCU Student Government; Ambassador Diop, Eddie O’Leary, President of the VCU Student Government.

It was at this moment that the PM produced a letter signed by Mayor Ibrahima Thiero of Ségou, inviting Richmond to become Ségou’s Sister City. And at that moment, Virginia Friends of Mali was born, as Richmond’s door into West Africa.