Kipala

User:Kipala has passed away

Per an email to Wikimedia-L, Antoni Mtavangu (co-founder of Wikimedia Tanzania) has advised the community that Ingo Koll (User:Kipala) died on July 10, 2023 in his home country of Germany. Kipala made over a thousand contributions to both English and German Wikipedia, as well as Wikidata, but his primary focus was on Swahili Wikipedia, where he had over 52,000 edits. He lived for many years in Kenya and Tanzania, and was both a Wiki-leader and educator, creating and leading educational workshops and training events and leading edit-a-thons in Kiswahili. His absence will be felt throughout the Wikimedia world, but especially amongst his many colleagues in Eastern Africa. Condolences to his family and his colleagues. Risker (talk) 00:38, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

Oh no. May he rest in peace. I had the pleasure of meeting him, and we exchanged many emails. His giant contribution to the development of knowledge and Wikipedia community in Swahili, one of the most spoken languages of Africa and of the whole world, will live forever. Condolences to his family. We lost a unique and truly great person. Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 04:58, 12 July 2023 (UTC)

I first met Ingo at WikiIndaba 2014, and will primarily remember him as the guy who collected and analyzed African languages development on our project. I know his activities went beyond this, but anytime I would need such an info, he would be my source.
Later, I mostly interacted with him on offline solutions and resources.
The last I heard from him was June 6th, when he sent me an email saying « Hi Florence. I am in Germany now. my circumstances have changed a bit, i got a health issue which will probably not allow me to continue in Tanzania as planned. I wil go back coming week for a handover and to empty our house. if possible i would like to leave a wikipedia offline installation at the college where I taught... etc » I think this will be how I remember Ingo. His dedication and commitment to helping our Wikimedia communities and his peers in Tanzania. Anthere (talk) 08:57, 12 July 2023 (UTC)