Nasibu Sareva, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at the African Development Center (ADC) has been named Interim Executive Director by the center’s board following the August 25 death of Hussein Samatar [2] after complications arising from Leukemia. Samatar was the center’s founder and executive director.
Sareva, a native of Tanzania, has since May been in charge of operations at the center which is when the late Samatar underwent a bone marrow transplant. He has been assisted in that role by ADC’s Communications and Development Director, Matthew Holm.
The board action this week formalizes the arrangement and names Sareva and Holm as executive director and deputy director respectively.
Other than the intense scrutiny that comes with being executive director of a now larger than life organization as ADC due to its groundbreaking innovations in immigrant loan financing, Mr. Sareva’s assumption of his new role should not be new territory to him. For the latter half of the late Samatar’s tenure at ADC, Sareva has been the chief financial spokesperson for the organization and assisted the late Samatar in strategic and tactical matters while also overseeing the organization’s lending operations.
A statement from the board which is chaired by Mr. Bamson Fadipe sent to Mshale said “ADC Board convened to make a decision for interim leadership of the organization, as well as create a road map for the process of determining the new leadership necessary to not only maintain, but build on the successes of such an important organization within our state.”
Stating that charting the course ahead following the loss of its founder will not be easy, the board however expressed gratitude and appreciation for Samatar’s foresight in seeding the organization “with a deep bench of dedicated practitioners ready to continue this crucial work for Minnesota”. Matthew Holm, who becomes interim executive director under Sareva, has since joining procured nearly $2M in funding.
Before coming to ADC, Sareva worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers as a Field Researcher. He has a BA in Accounting from the International Islamic University in Malaysia, and an MBA in Accounting from Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri.
About Tom Gitaa Gitaa, Editor-in-Chief [3]
Born and raised in Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa, Tom is the Founder, Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of Mshale which has been reporting on the news and culture of African immigrants in the United States since 1995. He has a BA in Business from Metro State University and a Public Leadership Credential from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. He was the original host of Talking Drum, the signature current affairs show on the African Broadcasting Network (ABN-America), which was available nationwide in the United States via the Dish Network satellite service. On the show, he interviewed Nobel laureates such as 2004 Nobel Peace prize winner, Professor Wangari Maathai, the first woman from Africa to win the peace prize and heads of states. Tom has served and chaired various boards including Global Minnesota (formerly Minnesota International Center), the sixth largest World Affairs Council in the United States. He has previously served as the first Black President of the Board of Directors at Books for Africa. He also serves on the boards of New Vision Foundation and the Minnesota Multicultural Media Consortium. He has previously served two terms on the board of the United Nations Association. An avid runner, he retired from running full marathons after turning 50 and now only focuses on training for half marathons.
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