Slick pundit of style

ESHUN marks a generational shift from Philip Dodd, the former New Statesman journalist, academic and broadcaster whose manner was that of a rather stately radical. By contrast, Eshun has Hoxton credentials, living with his girlfriend near Old Street, and takes fashionably outspoken positions against targets ranging from the royal family (he favours "a proper republic") to the Metropolitan Police campaign against middleclass cocaine use.

So what will he bring to the role? "I'd expect him to take it younger, more mainstream, like a littlebrother version of Tate Modern," predicts the journalist Richard Benson, who has known Eshun since they both worked on The Face in the early Nineties. "At that time he'd be bringing in stories about the modern artists Gavin Turk and Marc Quinn before anyone had heard of them, and as his editor, I'd tell him that was stupid. But he was proved right - he has that pop sensibility."

Born in London, he spent part of his childhood in Ghana, where his father, a diplomat, fell foul of the regime and spent time in jail. He was educated at Kingsbury High School in north-west London before studying politics and history at the London School of Economics.

Miranda Sawyer, who has known him since he wrote for Just Seventeen magazine, believes that his ambition stems from his family background. "One moment he was living in splendour, the next it was gone. His dad was very keen on his sons being well educated."

Eshun recently returned to Ghana to trace his family's history. What he discovered sickened him. "To my disgust, I discovered that my ancestor of seven generations past had been a slave trader," he explained - a white man from Holland who had settled in Ghana, and whose mixed-race son had continued the trade. "My ancestors may have been long dead, but I still felt morally culpable for their actions."

He has written about growing up black in Britain, and about the racism and bullying he has suffered. But he is sensitive to accusations that he has been helped in his media career by the relative paucity of articulate ethnicminority voices.

"Any time there's a race angle, he is called on to talk about it," a friend explains. "He's not that comfortable with it, but the one thing Ekow understands is what the media needs. And he'll take that opportunity."

His greatest exposure has come through his cultural critiques on Newsnight Review. His self-consciously thoughtful performances have not always been appreciated: to the Daily Mail, he is "achingly pretentious".

"He can come across as too clever and not passionate, but that's not the case," says his fellow pundit Miranda Sawyer. "The trouble is he's so clever that he tends to articulate his views rather over-intellectually."

So surprised was he to get the job that Eshun has asked for time to think through his plans. Will he cope when he arrives in May? "He's a charming guy, so he should be able to get the staff to love him," says one of his commissioning editors.

Yet if he is to restore the ICA to the heart of London's cultural life, that charm will need to be accompanied by a clear vision and a core of steel.