As Professor Babajide Owoeye marks his 70th birthday, his life offers a remarkable story of scholarship, vision, and institution-building in Nigeria’s educational landscape. Renowned as a scholar of International Relations, he is equally distinguished as an educational entrepreneur whose vision spans the entire knowledge value chain. From establishing a book publishing enterprise to founding a college and eventually pioneering Lead City University, Professor Owoeye continues to make enduring contributions to the development of higher education in Nigeria.
The Making of a Scholar
On the first day of March, 1956, a child was born in the heart of Yoruba Nigeria whose life would go on to define what it means to combine intellectual rigour with entrepreneurial courage. Professor Babajide Owoeye, known in academic circles as a professor of International Relations, and revered in Yoruba society as Borokini, did not arrive at greatness by accident. His journey began, as all enduring journeys do, with a strong foundation.
His earliest years of formal education were spent at the Our Lady of Mount Carmel College (OLMC) Demonstration School in Ibadan, where, between 1962 and 1967, young Jide received the foundational knowledge that would set the tone for a life of learning. Those early years instilled in him a discipline and intellectual appetite that would define every subsequent chapter of his story.
From there, he proceeded to Olivet Baptist High School in Oyo, where he completed his school certificate between 1968 and 1972, a period during which the seeds of character, conviction, and intellectual ambition were firmly planted. His secondary education was marked by both academic performance and a quality that all who later knew him would come to recognise as his signature trait: exceptional discipline. In 1973, he gained admission into Government College Ibadan for his Higher School Certificate, completing it in 1974, one of Nigeria’s most respected secondary institutions, which nurtured in him the bearing of a scholar and a gentleman.
A Scholar in Formation
Armed with the discipline of Government College and a burning intellectual curiosity, Owoeye gained admission to the University of Ibadan, Nigeria’s premier university, where he studied sociology, graduating with a B.Sc. (Honours) in 1977. It was a bold and deliberate choice. Sociology gave him the tools to interrogate society, to understand power, and to ask the deeper questions that his later work in international relations would demand.
Recognising that the world had more to offer him, he moved to the University of Ife — now Obafemi Awolowo University — for his postgraduate education. It was at Ife that he would earn both his Master’s degree in International Relations in 1983 and his PhD in International Relations in 1987, the latter supported by a highly competitive Japanese Government Scholarship that took him to Japan for doctoral fieldwork on Japan’s policy in Africa.
That scholarship was not merely a funding opportunity — it was a signal of the calibre of the man. Japan’s government scholarship is fiercely competitive, reserved for scholars of demonstrated excellence and intellectual promise. That Owoeye won it speaks to both his academic credentials and the quiet determination that has always characterised his pursuit of knowledge. His doctoral research on Japan’s African policy was described as groundbreaking, opening new scholarly conversations between Africa and Asia at a time when that relationship was poorly understood.
He further distinguished himself by earning a Postgraduate Diploma in Distance Learning from the University of South Africa (UNISA), a qualification that would later inform his vision for a more accessible and innovative model of higher education in Nigeria.
A Brief Detour and a Decisive Return
Upon completing his first degree, Owoeye, like many promising Nigerian graduates of his generation, briefly tested the waters of the private sector. He served as an Insurance Officer at Akin George & Company in Lagos between 1979 and 1980. But the world of commerce, it turned out, was never his final destination. The classroom beckoned with a far more compelling call.
In 1980, he made the decisive move that would define the next four decades of his life: he joined the Oyo State College of Arts and Science (OSCAS) in Ile-Ife as a Lecturer II in the Department of Government. Even while serving briefly as an administrative officer at Obafemi Awolowo University in 1983, the pull of pure academic engagement proved stronger. He soon joined the Department of International Relations at OAU as a senior lecturer, and from that point, there was no looking back.
“I have been in the university system for almost 37 years and 24 of those years were spent in the public university system. I noticed then that if one has passion for education, one should have seen some of the lapses in the system, and some of those lapses can only be corrected if one is the head of the institution.”
This candid reflection, shared in a 2019 interview with The Punch, captures not just a career pivot but a philosophy. As Owoeye was seeking advancement, he was also on the quest to change a system from within and, eventually, from the top.
Rising Through the Ranks at OAU
His ascent through Obafemi Awolowo University was steady, purposeful, and marked by distinction at every level. In the year 2002, he was appointed Professor of International Relations, the culmination of a career built on scholarship, service, and an unrelenting commitment to excellence. For Owoeye himself, it was the peak of his profession.
Throughout his tenure at OAU, he held strategic positions that went well beyond his role as a classroom teacher. He served as Head of the Department of International Relations, bringing administrative vision to an academic unit. He represented the department on the University Senate, navigating the complex terrain of institutional governance with the same clarity of mind that characterised his scholarly work.
Perhaps most significantly in the world of academic publishing, he served as Editor-in-Chief of the Quarterly Journal of Administration — Africa’s most prestigious academic management journal. He also founded and edited the African Journal of International Affairs and Development, which grew to its 17th volume and earned an association with the prestigious Oxford Round Table at the University of Oxford. These are not the achievements of a man simply doing his job; they are the achievements of a man building intellectual infrastructure for an entire continent.
His influence extended well beyond Nigerian borders. He served as a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs in Lagos, as an Associate Lecturer at the Foreign Policy Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and as a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security in Seoul, South Korea. He was a Nigerian delegate to the first Nigeria-South Africa Dialogue Seminar in Johannesburg in 1994 and was appointed as a Consultant on the OAU Reparations Project by the Secretary-General of the Organisation of African Unity.
Beyond his departmental duties, Professor Owoeye’s leadership extended to the university’s broader alumni community. He served as Secretary-General of the Home Branch of Obafemi Awolowo University Alumni Association and later held the same position for the National body for two distinguished terms, strengthening the bonds between the institution and its graduates across Nigeria.
Founding Lead City University
In February 2005, after twenty-five years of service to Obafemi Awolowo University, Professor Owoeye did something that surprised many and inspired more: he voluntarily retired and founded Lead City University in Ibadan, one of Nigeria’s pioneering private universities. It was a calculated risk of the highest order, but Owoeye had never been a man who confused caution with wisdom.
But Lead City University was only one element of a comprehensive educational ecosystem that Professor Owoeye had been building for nearly two decades. As early as 1986, he had established College Press & Publishers Ltd. in Jericho, Ibadan—a publishing house dedicated to producing quality educational materials. In 1998, seven years before the university, he founded Lead City International School, also in Jericho, Ibadan, demonstrating his commitment to excellence at every level of education. Through Eduserve Consult, an educational consultancy firm he chairs, he has provided strategic guidance to institutions across Nigeria.
Recognising that educational access requires financial inclusion, Professor Owoeye established Lead City Microfinance Bank Ltd. in 2008 (now fully digitalised as of 2010) to provide educational loans for students and welfare services for staff. His vision for comprehensive educational infrastructure later expanded to include media, with the establishment of Lead City FM Radio 89.1 in 2015 and Lead FM 106.3 in 2017. These interconnected enterprises have created immense opportunities for training, skill acquisition, career development, and employment for countless Nigerians, transforming his educational philosophy into a self-sustaining ecosystem.
Lead City University, established the same year of his retirement, would become the living embodiment of everything he had believed education could and should be. As Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council, he has presided over the institution with the same intellectual seriousness and administrative discipline that marked his years at OAU, combined with the entrepreneurial agility that only a founder can summon.
He has consistently advocated for meaningful collaboration between private and public universities, between the academy and industry, between Nigeria’s educational institutions and their counterparts across Africa and the world. In a convocation lecture delivered at Protestant University in Rwanda, he articulated this vision with characteristic precision, calling for alignment between funding, quality assurance, and the broader demands of sustainable development across the continent.
“Today universities have come to play a pivotal role in the development of nations. Africa already possesses robust policy frameworks that underscore quality education as central to development.”
These are not the words of an administrator managing an institution. They are the words of a statesman shaping a continent’s intellectual future. Lead City University has gone on to host international academic events, offer scholarships to graduates from across Africa, and build partnerships that extend Nigeria’s educational reach far beyond its borders.
Borokini: The Social Architecture of a Great Man
Among the Yoruba, the title of Borokini is not given, it is earned. It represents the highest plateau of social achievement: a man who has acquired titles, commanded respect, been sought for wisdom, and whose very presence in a room changes the nature of the room. Professor Owoeye is, by any Yoruba reckoning, a Borokini of the first order.
His chieftaincy titles read like a roll call of Yoruba honor: the Obafunminiyi of Ibokun and the Aare Ona-Eko of Oke-Ila Orangun, both in Osun State (2008); the Aare Gbobaniyi of Ugboland, Ilaje, Ondo State (2010); the Olootu of the Source in Ile-Ife (2011); and the Agbaakin Atayese of Ibadanland (2013). These are not decorative honours. In the Yoruba social and political architecture, each chieftaincy title carries with it the weight of community responsibility, the expectation of generosity, and the obligation to serve as a bridge between personal achievement and communal good.
His philanthropic gestures extend far beyond ceremonial duties. He has provided scholarships for both tertiary and non-tertiary education, opening doors for young people who might otherwise have found them closed. These contributions to socio-economic development have earned him numerous recognitions, including the Award of Professional Excellence by the Central Council of Ibadan Indigenes (CCII) in 2009; the Distinguished Award for Educational and Community Leadership by the University of Texas at Austin (2015); the Kwame Nkrumah Award for Scholarly Contribution to Pan Africanism at the University of South Africa – UNISA (2016); the Award of Honour by the National Association of Government College Ibadan Old Boys Association (2017); and the Award of Lifetime Achievements and Commitment Service from the University of Ibadan (2018). He is a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (2020) and a Fellow of the Academy of International Affairs (FAIA) (2024).
His longtime friend and University of Texas Distinguished Professor, Toyin Falola, who has written about him at length, describes Owoeye in terms that capture both his personal magnetism and his social standing: a man of deep knowledge and pleasant behaviour; a share giver of money and of knowledge; a real man in the fullest Yoruba sense of the word. Those who know him speak of his remarkable memory for names and relationships, his calm in moments of institutional crisis, and his ability to lead without domination.
Yet beneath the titles, the charisma, and the national recognition, those closest to him consistently return to one word: humble. Despite his professorial rank, his chieftaincy titles, his role as a university founder, and his decades of influence in international affairs, Owoeye has remained, at his core, a teacher, approachable, curious, and deeply committed to the people around him.
Forty-Three Years of Partnership: The Owoeye Family
Behind every institution-builder is often a story of personal stability, of a home that holds firm even when the world outside is in flux. In 1982, Professor Owoeye married Taiwo Tolulope Owoeye (née Emuleomo), a highly resourceful woman who is herself a publisher and school administrator. That union—now over four decades strong—has been a source of grounding for a man whose professional life has demanded so much of his energy and attention.
Together they have been blessed with four children and many grandchildren, creating a family legacy that extends across generations. In a life as publicly demanding as his, the consistency of that family foundation speaks volumes. Forty-three years of marriage is not a footnote in a man’s biography—it is, in many ways, its most eloquent sentence. It says that the same discipline and commitment he brought to his academic work, he also brought to his home.
Highly principled with very strong Christian and family values, Professor Owoeye remains a sociable and community-minded person. He is a Trustee and active member of Ibadan Polo Club, Ibadan Golf Club, Ibadan Recreation Club, and the Youth Christian Circle of St James’s Cathedral, Oke-Bola Ibadan. These memberships reflect not social climbing but genuine community engagement—spaces where he continues to mentor, connect, and serve.
What Nigerian Youth Can Learn from Professor Owoeye
Professor Owoeye’s life offers a curriculum in patience, in the willingness to build slowly, in the courage to leave comfort for purpose, and in the discipline to sustain both a career and a character across seven decades without losing either.
For young people in Southwest Nigeria especially, there is particular resonance in his story. He grew up in the same Ibadan where many of them are growing up now. He attended the same kinds of schools many of them attend. He navigated the same systemic constraints – public universities underfunded, private sector opportunities limited, state institutions inconsistent – and he responded not with frustration or flight but with focused, incremental effort over decades.
His message on corporate governance is equally instructive. A university, he has argued, must not be run as a business, but neither can it be run without business sense. Institutions require accountability, transparency, and the courage to make difficult decisions. These are not abstract principles. They are the lived practices of a man who turned an idea into a functioning university in one of Africa’s most complex operating environments.
“If you aspire to have a better university system, it is either you head the institution or you look for avenues to help create one where you can impact upon. That was what brought about the passion to work towards establishing a private university where the quest for excellence can actually be attained.”
For Nigerian youth, this is the operative sentence. Do not merely criticise the system. Study it. Understand its gaps. Then position yourself, through years of patient, disciplined work, to fill those gaps. Whether in education, policy, entrepreneurship, or diplomacy, the Owoeye model is a model of strategic patience combined with decisive action at the right moment.
At seventy, Professor Jide Owoeye shows no signs of retreat. He continues to chair governing councils, deliver convocation lectures across Africa, advocate for public-private collaboration in education, and mentor the next generation of scholars and institution-builders. The Borokini tree, as Toyin Falola wrote, is still the one that provides shelter — still standing, still growing, still giving.