{"id":17625,"date":"2026-06-20T12:58:22","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T12:58:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev.iita.org\/news-item\/former-iita-staff-member-gets-prestigious-pan-african-award\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T17:06:01","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:06:01","slug":"former-iita-staff-member-gets-prestigious-pan-african-award","status":"publish","type":"news-item","link":"https:\/\/iita.org\/fr\/news-item\/former-iita-staff-member-gets-prestigious-pan-african-award\/","title":{"rendered":"Former IITA staff member gets prestigious pan-African award"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_278\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\">\n\n<a href=\"http:\/\/bulletin.iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/JOHN-GODSON_opt.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"attachment noopener wp-att-278\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-278 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/JOHN-GODSON_opt-300x239-1.jpg\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/JOHN-GODSON_opt-300x239-2.jpg 300w, https:\/\/iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/JOHN-GODSON_opt-450x359.jpg 450w, https:\/\/iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/JOHN-GODSON_opt.jpg 493w\" alt=\"John Godson\" width=\"300\" height=\"239\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-278\" \/><\/a>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-278\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">John Godson<\/p>\n\n<\/div>\n<em>NewAfrican<\/em>\u2015Pan-Africa\u2019s best selling magazine has named John Godson, a former IITA staff member, one of the\u00a0<u><a href=\"http:\/\/newafricanmagazine.com\/december-2015\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">100 most influential Africans in 2015<\/a><\/u>. Godson was recognized for his laudable efforts to change Polish attitudes about Africa.\n\nThe magazine wrote:\n\n<em>The Nigerian has managed to accomplish one of the most interesting feats in the Diaspora. He became the first black member of the Polish Parliament as part of the Polish People\u2019s Party. He managed to accomplish this at the height of racial tensions in the country. Since he won his seat, he has devoted a large part of his time to trying to change Polish attitudes to Africa and black people.<\/em>\n\n<em>\u201cI\u2019ve always said and still underline, that in my opinion there is no racism in Poland. There is, however, something that I call low intercultural competencies. And this can be changed by more contact between different cultures and societal groups. No law can change the mentality of people.\u201d<\/em>\n\nLast week, IITA signed an MoU with his organization, the African Institute, Poland (AI), under which both parties agreed to establish a link to foster cooperation for the development and implementation of collaborative programs, especially in the areas of biotechnology and agribusiness.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NewAfrican\u2015Pan-Africa\u2019s best selling magazine has named John Godson, a former IITA staff member, one of the 100 most influential Africans in 2015. Godson was recognized for his laudable efforts to change Polish attitudes about Africa.<\/p>","protected":false},"featured_media":17626,"template":"","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}}},"tags":[2356],"science-area":[],"program":[],"location":[32],"news-type":[],"hub":[61],"crop":[],"impact-areas":[],"item-year":[194],"class_list":["post-17625","news-item","type-news-item","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-bulletin-no-2310","location-nigeria","hub-western-africa","item-year-194"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Former IITA staff member gets prestigious pan-African award - IITA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/fr\/news-item\/former-iita-staff-member-gets-prestigious-pan-african-award\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"fr_FR\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Former IITA staff member gets prestigious pan-African award - IITA\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"NewAfrican\u2015Pan-Africa\u2019s best selling magazine has named John Godson, a former IITA staff member, one of the 100 most influential Africans in 2015. 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