Dr. TOGBEY Kwamy Maoussi Félix

The only child born to both his parents, TOGBEY Sossou Mathias and SABLIKOU Omoloyè Anastasie, and the eldest of all his brothers and sisters, the late TOGBEY Kwamy Maoussi Félix “de Valois” was born on Saturday 20 November 1948 in Tcharé-Baou, in the Ogou prefecture of Togo. The son of a modest schoolteacher, he was a most diligent student, earning his série-D baccalauréat with the assez bien grade and placing first among the candidates of his examining board, at the Lycée Béhanzin in Porto-Novo, Benin, in 1971. Awarded a scholarship by the Belgian Government, he began his studies in veterinary medicine in Liège, Belgium. After brilliantly completing his first university year — the only one of the eight recipients of that competitive scholarship to advance to the next year — Félix, for reasons of his own, chose to return to Togo to study human medicine, a field in which he believed he could be of greater service to his country. And so, in 1981, he earned his State Doctorate in Medicine, after defending a thesis awarded the highest honours (très honorable), the congratulations of the jury and authorisation for its exchange among universities, at the Université du Bénin (UB, now the University of Lomé) — becoming part of the second graduating class of doctors trained at the country's faculty of medicine since its founding in Togo. Once again, it was on a new scholarship that this future pioneer of Togolese medicine pursued these studies at the UB.

The month after he received his diploma, Dr. Togbey was immediately recruited into the civil service, beginning his career as a physician in July 1981 at the hospital in Tabligbo (Yoto prefecture), before returning a few years later to Lomé to take up, from 1983, the post of Director of the Lomé Health Centre (Woétrivi Condji) — at the time the second most important health facility in Lomé after the CHU-Tokoin. As his career advanced, he was assigned in 1985 to the Bè Health Centre, then in a dire state. It was under his leadership, and through a partnership with German Cooperation in Togo via the GTZ project, that by his rigour and dedication Dr. Togbey raised this modest health centre to the status of a Secondary Hospital — a referral institution of excellence, of which he became the first Director under this new standing. Alongside his duties, he embraced an academic career as a lecturer in physiology at the UB faculty of medicine. He was also the occupational physician of the EDITOGO printing house. A great football enthusiast, he served for several years as the sports physician of the national football team; in that capacity he led the medical delegation that accompanied the Sparrowhawks (Éperviers) of Togo to their first World Cup appearance, in the under-20 category, in 1987 in Chile. After several years of preparation toward becoming a CAMES-accredited Associate Professor (Maître de Conférences Agrégé), he was awarded an American scholarship to pursue further studies in the United States, thus turning from his academic career in 1994. He went on to earn his Master's degree in Public Health from the University of Hawaii at Honolulu in 1996.

Returning to the civil service after earning this degree, Dr. Togbey — only a few months after a brief tenure at the Ministry of Health — secured his first non-governmental post with the NGO CARE International in 1996, where he jointly led projects in Togo, Benin and Ghana. Ever eager to take on new challenges, he obtained another position with UNICEF Togo as a Health Programmes Administrator in 2000. The mark of excellence he left with his former employer CARE International earned him a recall by that institution in 2003, this time to serve as Chief of Party on the five-year Keneya Ciwara Project in Mali. Finding that it could no longer do without his exceptional gifts, the organisation entrusted him successively with posts in various countries — notably the USA and Côte d'Ivoire — before bringing him back once more to Mali, where he retired in 2017. At the very start of his retirement, only months after handing over to his successor, CARE called upon him again in Mali, where he once more lent his technical assistance for several months on a project. That mission accomplished, he chose this time to step away for good, to henceforth fully enjoy a well-deserved retirement, after years of hard work throughout his active life.

A Baptist Christian, a man of faith and principle, deeply disciplined, Dr. Togbey — despite his many divine blessings and abundant successes — always knew how to keep his humility. His many virtues — integrity, punctuality, self-sacrifice, resilience, love of neighbour, discretion and his love of peace, to name but a few — are beyond any doubt.

He was a lover of nature and a great devotee of reading and travel. Dr. Togbey spent much of his retirement savouring his travels around the world, and loved to spend time with his children and grandchildren. Anything could be wrested from him but his love for his home village, Agomé-Glozou, where he so loved to live — not to mention the long morning walks on which he would so often share, with his children, friends and loved ones, the wonders of the landscapes they crossed. Judging that he had completed his mission on this earth, God chose to call him home on Sunday 24 May 2026 — Pentecost Sunday, as though in a powerful sign — leaving behind his wife, six (6) children and thirteen (13) grandchildren.