‘Ghana is KC’s home team in World Cup’: How the West African soccer powerhouse matches Kansas City’s story

When Ghana punched its ticket to a World Cup match against Colombia Friday in Kansas City, Nia Webster already knew who she’d be cheering for. The West African country has become a second home to Webster, who first began making trips to Ghana as a child.

Webster family members — Ajamu, Kinda, Hashina, Zoe and Nia — outside the departures and arrivals area of the Kansas City International Airport; courtesy photo

“It completely changed my perspective on how I thought about the world,” said Webster, assistant director of Kansas City’s Neighborhood Services Department. “My mind expanded.”

Today, she leads the City of Entrepreneurs — an initiative by Kansas City, Missouri, and the Economic Development Corporation of Kansas City (EDCKC) to help founders build and grow businesses across Kansas City — with its marquee efforts Open Doors! and a vendor marketplace at Union Station making headlines during the five-week FIFA World Cup.

Her parents, Ajamu and Kinda Webster, will be watching Friday’s game (the tournament’s final Round of 32 match) from Ghana, where they retired after selling the engineering firm they spent more than three decades building in Kansas City. (The recently were in the metro for parts of the World Cup, but returned home before Friday’s matchup was known.)

With the Ghana’s Black Stars — a reference to the black star on the nation’s flag that represents pan-Africanism and freedom from slavery — now set to arrive for a high-profile showdown at Kansas City Stadium, the family sees ties between the metro and the African nation that many overlook.

“There’s a bigger story to tell about the connection between Ghana and Kansas City,” said Webster.

Nia Webster, the core organizer behind Kansas City’s City of Entrepreneurs initiative introduces Open Doors! entrepreneurs to gathered media, content creators and influencers; photo by Tommy Felts, Startland News

Building something bigger

Ajamu Webster founded DuBois Consultants, a civil and structural engineering firm, in 1989. Over the next 30-plus years, he watched Kansas City’s entrepreneurial ecosystem evolve — particularly for minority-owned businesses trying to grow beyond the startup stage.

Programs designed to help such businesses opened doors, but building a company that could scale proved much harder.

“(Resources were) pretty much set up for startups, but not for small businesses growing in scale,” Ajamu Webster recalled.

Watching her parents build a business gave Nia Webster a front-row seat to those challenges long before she joined City Hall.

After graduating from college, she worked within the family business before eventually moving into city government, where she now helps entrepreneurs overcome many of the same barriers her parents encountered.

“I was the first one to kind of jump out and try to do something different,” said Webster.

Her father sees echoes of his own career in the work she leads today, especially as initiatives like City of Entrepreneurs aim to provide new opportunities for those who might need them most.

“You have to be really intentional about those sorts of things,” said Ajamu Webster.

The road to Ghana

Moving to Ghana wasn’t a spontaneous decision. After years of traveling throughout West Africa, Ajamu and Kinda Webster sold DuBois Consultants in 2021 and moved to Ghana the following year. It was the culmination of a plan they’d been working toward for decades.

The couple first took the family to Africa when Nia was about 6, returning often enough that Ghana gradually became more than a destination. Along the way, their daughter learned about the country’s role in the transatlantic slave trade and its efforts to reconnect members of the African diaspora through events like Panafest.

For years, the Websters kept returning to Ghana. And that was the point, said Ajamu Webster.

“Ghana is very open to repatriation,” he explained. “It turned out to be the gateway to the African continent for us.”

Webster family members — Hashina, Ajamu, and Nia — outside the departures and arrivals area of the Kansas City International Airport; courtesy photo

Seeing the world differently

Those childhood trips left a lasting mark on Nia Webster long before her parents made their big retirement move.

Traveling across West Africa exposed her to different cultures and communities while reshaping the way she thinks about neighborhoods, tourism and the world around her, she said.

“People in America were fed a lot of things about Africa,” Webster said. “When you travel, you get to see that it’s not what you thought. Then you realize how much we take for granted here.”

One trip, in particular, changed the way she thinks about community, she said. In 2018, Webster returned to Ghana with her oldest son for Panafest. He had learned to play African drums through Kansas City’s African-centered education community, and the instrument became an instant link to people they met along the way.

“We would go to the marketplace, and he would make connections with people no matter where we went,” she said. “Somebody always knew my son. They looked after us, made sure we got where we needed to go, and welcomed us. It was a different type of hospitality.”

She laughed about how easy it was to find her son in the middle of a crowded West African marketplace.

“All I had to do was follow the drum beats,” Webster said.

Her parents settling into life in Ghana also changed the way she thinks about her own future, she said.

“Watching them has really inspired me to do what I wanted to do,” Webster said. “It was always a dream of mine, and it’s comforting to know I have a second home.”

Welcoming the Black Stars

The World Cup arrives as Kansas City and Ghana continue building relationships beyond the pitch.

Earlier this year, Councilwoman Reyna Park Shaw, who also is Kansas City’s mayor pro tem and a board member for EDCKC, traveled to Accra — the capital of Ghana — as city leaders continued discussions around a formal partnership between the two cities. Ajamu Webster, who remains active in Kansas City civic and economic development efforts while living in Ghana, said the timing is perfect.

“I don’t think you could have written that script any better,” he said.

He hopes Kansas Citians embrace Ghanaian visitors with the same warmth his family found after relocating to West Africa.

“Ghana has been very welcoming to African Americans,” said Ajamu Webster. “Since Ghana has extended its arms to us that way, I would say the people of Kansas City should extend their arms to Ghana.”

His daughter sees potential for the World Cup to reshape global perceptions long after the final whistle — and not just for travelers experiencing the Heartland for the first time, she said.

“I hope that for people who’ve never traveled outside of Kansas City, let alone the country, it opens their eyes to the world,” said Webster. “I just want people to get out and experience the world, because it will impact how they live and how they treat other people.”

For the Webster family, the World Cup is another reminder that home can exist in more than one place.

“Ghana is Kansas City’s home team in World Cup soccer,” said Ajamu Webster. “That’s how we ought to treat it.”