By Bazona Barnabe Bado
Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani hosted his first African Heritage reception at Gracie Mansion on September 9, 2026, bringing together hundreds of guests to celebrate the African communities, cultures, and contributions that continue to shape New York City.
Although African communities have previously gathered at Gracie Mansion for similar celebrations, Mayor Mamdani gave the reception a distinct format by hosting it inside the mansion, unlike former mayors Bill de Blasio and Eric Adams, who traditionally held the event outdoors.
Attendees included elected official Yusef Salaam; Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Dr. Helen Arteaga; African head of the Department of Investigation Commissioner Nadia Shihata; Ambassador Mohamed Idris, permanent observer of the African Union to the United Nations; and Consul General Tamer El Miligy. Mamdani’s parents also attended, and he introduced his father as “the proudest African I have ever known.”
“I was born in Nsambya Hospital in Kampala, Uganda. And that is where I made my first friends, where I walked my first steps, where I developed my first sense of how the world sounded and tasted,” Mayor Mamdani said. His middle name, Kwame, was given to him by his father in honor of Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first prime minister and one of the continent’s clearest voices for Pan-Africanism.
Mayor Mamdani noted that Nkrumah fought for freedom in Africa and led Ghana to become the first sub-Saharan African nation to win independence.
“And that struggle for freedom, it endures today in the nations our families come from, and in the African New Yorkers seeking to live lives of dignity in the city they call home,” he said. 
For Mayor Mamdani, many Africans living in New York have not forgotten their roots. “When strangers come up to me and start speaking Luganda, it strikes me as a small miracle, proof of the decision that so many African New Yorkers have made, both alone and together, to never leave Africa behind,” he said.
In her remarks, Adama Bah, chief executive director and founder of Africana, said, “We don’t want only our culture to be celebrated; we want our voices to shape the policies that affect our lives.”
Salim Drammeh, African liaison at the Mayor’s Office, and Amy Andrieux, executive director of the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Arts, spoke about the impact communities can have when they work together.
“The ties that bind us run deeper than the lines that have been drawn to keep us apart,” Mayor Mamdani concluded.