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THE NOBEL LAUREATES OF AFRICA - KOFI ANNAN

Kofi Atta Annan (born 8 April 1938) is a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations from January 1997 to December 2006. Annan and the United Nations were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world." He is the founder and the Chairman of the Kofi Annan Foundation, as well as being the chairman of The Elders, a group founded by Nelson Mandela.

From 23 February until 31 August 2012, Annan was the UN–Arab League Joint Special Representative for Syria, to help find a resolution to ongoing conflict there. Annan quit after becoming frustrated with the UN's lack of progress with regard to conflict resolution, stating that "when the Syrian people desperately need action, there continues to be finger-pointing and name-calling in the Security Council". He has been involved in several humanitarian projects and won several awards including the Kora All Africa Music Lifetime Achievement Award in 2001.

Secretary-General of the United Nations

Appointment

On 13 December 1996, the United Nations Security Council recommended Annan to replace the previous Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt, whose second term faced the veto of the United States. Confirmed four days later by the vote of the General Assembly, he started his first term as Secretary-General on 1 January 1997. He was reelected for a second term in 2001, which was unusual since this meant a third term for Africa. The Asian states didn't protest although it should have been their turn because Annan was so popular among the UN member states and UN staff.

Activities

Recommendations for UN reform

Millennium Development Goals

The United Nations Global Compact

Establishment of The Global Fund

Responsibility to Protect

Lubbers sexual-harassment investigation

Nobel Peace Prize

In 2001, its centennial year, the Nobel Committee decided that the Peace Prize was to be divided between the United Nations (UN) and Kofi Annan. Annan was awarded the Peace Prize for having revitalized the UN and for having given priority to human rights. The Nobel Committee also recognized his commitment to the struggle to containing the spread of HIV in Africa and his declared opposition to international terrorism.

Farewall Adresses

On 19 September 2006, Annan gave a farewell address to world leaders gathered at the UN headquarters in New York, in anticipation of his retirement on 31 December. In the speech he outlined three major problems of "an unjust world economy, world disorder, and widespread contempt for human rights and the rule of law", which he believes "have not resolved, but sharpened" during his time as Secretary-General. He also pointed to violence in Africa, and the Arab-Israeli conflict as two major issues warranting attention.

On 11 December 2006, in his final speech as Secretary-General, delivered at the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library in Independence, Missouri, Annan recalled Truman's leadership in the founding of the United Nations. He called for the United States to return to President Truman's multilateralist foreign policies, and to follow Truman's credo that "the responsibility of the great states is to serve and not dominate the peoples of the world". He also said that the United States must maintain its commitment to human rights, "including in the struggle against terrorism."

Kofi Annan Foundation

In 2007, Kofi Annan established the Kofi Annan Foundation, an independent, not-for profit organization which works to promote better global governance and strengthen the capacities of people and countries to achieve a fairer, more peaceful world.

THE NOBEL LAUREATES OF AFRICA - MOHAMMED ElBARADEI

Mohamed Mustafa ElBaradei (born 17 June 1942) is an Egyptian law scholar and diplomat who was the last Vice President of Egypt serving on an acting basis from 14 July 2013 until his resignation on 14 August 2013.He was the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an intergovernmental organization under the auspices of the United Nations, from 1997 to 2009. He and the IAEA were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005. ElBaradei was also prominently featured in the Western press regarding relatively recent politics in Egypt, particularly the 2011 revolution which ousted President Hosni Mubarak, and the 2013 Egyptian coup d'état.

Public career as IAEA Director General (1997 - 2009)

ElBaradei began to serve as Director General of the IAEA, which is based in Vienna, on 1 December 1997, succeeding Hans Blix of Sweden.He was re-elected for two more four-year terms in 2001 and in 2005. His third and last term ended in November 2009. ElBaradei's tenure has been marked by high-profile, non-proliferation issues, which include the inspections in Iraq preceding the March 2003 invasion, and tensions over the nuclear program of Iran.

Nobel Peace Prize

On 7 October 2005, ElBaradei and the IAEA were announced as joint recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize for their "efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy, for peaceful purposes, is used in the safest possible way." ElBaradei donated all of his winnings to building orphanages in Cairo. The IAEA's winnings are being spent to train scientists from developing countries to use nuclear techniques in combating cancer and malnutrition. ElBaradei is the fourth Egyptian to receive the Nobel Prize, following Anwar Sadat (1978 in Peace),Naguib Mahfouz (1988 in Literature), and Ahmed Zewail (1999 in Chemistry).

In his Nobel lecture, ElBaradei said that the changing landscape of nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament may be defined by the emergence of an extensive black market in nuclear material and equipment, the proliferation of nuclear weapons and sensitive nuclear

technology, and the stagnation in nuclear disarmament. To combat proliferation, ElBaradei has suggested keeping nuclear and radiological material out of the hands of extremist groups, tightening control over the operations for producing the nuclear material that could be used in weapons, and accelerating disarmament efforts. ElBaradei also stated that only one percent of the money spent to develop new weapons would be enough to feed the entire world and that, if we hope to escape self-destruction, nuclear weapons should have no place in our collective conscience and no role in our security.

United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said that he was delighted that the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize had been awarded to the UN nuclear watchdog and its head, ElBaradei. "The secretary general congratulates him and the entire staff of the agency, past and present, on their contributions to global peace," a spokesman for Annan said.

PHOTO-QUOTE OF THE DAY

THE NOBEL LAUREATES OF AFRICA - AHMED ZEWAIL HASSAN

Ahmed Hassan Zewail (born February 26, 1946) is an American and Egyptian scientist, known as the "father of femtochemistry", he won the 1999 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on femtochemistry and became the first Arab scientist to win a Nobel Prize in a scientific field. He is the Linus Pauling Chair Professor of Chemistry, Professor of Physics, and the director of the Physical Biology Center for Ultrafast Science and Technology at the California Institute of Technology.

Career

After completing his PhD, Zewail did postdoctoral research at the University of California, Berkeley supervised by Charles Bonner Harris. Following this, he was awarded a faculty appointment at the California Institute of Technology in 1976, where he has remained since 1990, he was made the first Linus Pauling Chair in Chemical Physics. He became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1982.

Zewail has been nominated and will participate in President Barack Obama's Presidential Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), an advisory group of the nation's leading scientists and engineers to advise the President and Vice President and formulate policy in the areas of science, technology, and innovation.

Awards and Honors

In 1999, Zewail became the third Egyptian national to receive the Nobel Prize. Zewail gave his Nobel Lecture on "Femtochemistry: Atomic-Scale Dynamics of the Chemical Bond Using Ultrafast Lasers". His prize was following Egyptian president Anwar Al-Sadat (1978 in Peace), Naguib Mahfouz (1988 in Literature). Mohamed ElBaradei followed him (2005 in peace). Other international awards include the Wolf Prize in Chemistry (1993) awarded to him by the Wolf Foundation, the Tolman Medal (1997), the Robert A. Welch Award (1997), the Othmer Gold Medal in 2009, the Priestley Medal from the American Chemical Society and Davy Medal from the Royal Society in 2011.He was elected a Foreign Member of the Royal Society (ForMemRS) in 2001. In 1999, he received Egypt's highest state honor, the Grand Collar of the Nile.

Zewail was awarded an honorary doctorate by Lund University in Sweden in May 2003 and is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Cambridge University awarded him an honorary Doctor of Science in 2006. In October 2006, Zewail received the Albert Einstein World Award of Science for his pioneering development of the new field femtoscience and for his seminal contributions to the revolutionary discipline of physical biology, creating new ways for better understanding the functional behavior of biological systems by directly visualizing them in the four dimensions of space and time. In May 2008, Zewail received an honorary doctorate from Complutense University of Madrid. In February, 2009, Zewail was awarded an honorary doctorate in arts and sciences by the University of Jordan. In May 2010, he received a Doctor of Humane Letters from Southwestern University. In October/2011 he was awarded an honorary doctorate in science from the University of Glasgow, UK His students include scientists like Martin Gruebele. He also has won the King Faisal award in 1989. The Zewail city of science and technology is named in his honour.

Zewail also received an Honorary Doctorate from Heriot-Watt University in 2002.

THE NOBEL LAUREATES OF AFRICA - NAGUIB MAHFOUZ

Naguib Mahfouz (December 11, 1911 – August 30, 2006) was an Egyptian writer who won the 1988 Nobel Prize for Literature. He is regarded as one of the first contemporary writers of Arabic literature, along with Tawfiq el-Hakim, to explore themes of existentialism. He published 34 novels, over 350 short stories, dozens of movie scripts, and five plays over a 70-year career. Many of his works have been made into Egyptian and foreign films.

Writing career

Photo of Naguib Mahfouz on wall of Kirsha's café, which was mentioned in his novel Midaq Alley

Mahfouz published 34 novels, over 350 short stories, dozens of movie scripts and five plays over a 70-year career. Possibly his most famous work, The Cairo Trilogy, depicts the lives of three generations of different families in Cairo from World War I until after the 1952 military coup that overthrew King Farouk. He was a board member of the publisher Dar el-Ma'aref. Many of his novels were serialized in Al-Ahram, and his writings also appeared in his weekly column, "Point of View". Before the Nobel Prize only a few of his novels had appeared in the West.

Nobel Prize for Literature

Mahfouz was awarded the 1988 Nobel Prize in Literature, the only Arab writer to have won the award. Shortly after winning the prize Mahfouz was quoted as saying "The Nobel Prize has given me, for the first time in my life, the feeling that my literature could be appreciated on an international level. The Arab world also won the Nobel with me. I believe that international doors have opened, and that from now on, literate people will consider Arab literature also. We deserve that recognition."The Swedish letter to Mahfouz included the quotations "rich and complex work invites us to reconsider the fundamental things in life. Themes like the nature of time and love, society and norms, knowledge and faith recur in a variety of situations and are presented in thought-provoking, evocative, and clearly daring ways. And the poetic quality of your prose can be felt across the language barrier. In the prize citation you are credited with the forming of an Arabian narrative art that applies to all mankind." Because Mahfouz found traveling to Sweden difficult at his age, he did not attend the award ceremony.

Attempted assassination

The appearance of The Satanic Verses brought back up the controversy surrounding Mahfouz's novelChildren of Gebelawi. Death threats against Mahfouz followed, including one from the "blind sheikh," Egyptian-born Omar Abdul-Rahman. Mahfouz was given police protection, but in 1994 an Islamic extremist succeeded in attacking the 82-year-old novelist by stabbing him in the neck outside his Cairo home.

He survived, permanently affected by damage to nerves of his right upper limb. After the incident Mahfouz was unable to write for more than a few minutes a day and consequently produced fewer and fewer works. Subsequently, he lived under constant bodyguard protection. Finally, in the beginning of 2006, the novel was published in Egypt with a preface written by Ahmad Kamal Aboul-Magd. After the threats, Mahfouz stayed in Cairo with his lawyer Nabil Mounir Habib. Mahfouz and Mounir would spend most of their time in Mounir's office; Mahfouz used Mounir's library as a reference for most of his books. Mahfouz stayed with Mounir until his death.

Personal life

Mahfouz remained a bachelor until age 43 because he believed that with its numerous restrictions and limitations, marriage would hamper his literary future. "I was afraid of marriage . . . especially when I saw how busy my brothers and sisters were with social events because of it. This one went to visit people, that one invited people. I had the impression that married life would take up all my time. I saw myself drowning in visits and parties. No freedom."

However, in 1954, he quietly married a Coptic Orthodox woman from Alexandria, Atiyyatallah Ibrahim, with whom he had two daughters, Fatima and Umm Kalthum. The couple initially lived on a houseboat in the Agouza section of Cairo on the west bank of the Nile, then moved to an apartment along the river in the same area. Mahfouz avoided public exposure, especially inquiries into his private life, which might have become, as he put it, “a silly topic in journals and radio programs.”

AFRICAN LEADER OF THE WEEK - KWAME NKRUMAH

In PlatinumBlack Afican Crusaders, we celebrate PlatinumBlack leaders who have caused positive changes in the lives of the people of Africa by their amiable character and excellent good will. Leaders whose legacy are still strongly alive and their lives being models to pattern younger lives after. Our PlatinumBlack leader this week is...                    

Kwame Nkrumah

Kwame Nkrumah PC (September 18 or 21, 1909 – 27 April 1972) led Ghana to independence from Britain in 1957 and served as its first prime minister and president. Nkrumah first gained power as leader of the colonial Gold Coast, and held it until he was deposed in 1966.

An influential 20th-century advocate of Pan-Africanism, he was a founding member of the Organization of African Unity and was the winner of the Lenin Peace Prize in 1962.

According to intelligence documents released by the American Office of the Historian, "Nkrumah was doing more to undermine [US government] interests than any other black African."

Early life and education

Gold Coast

Kwame Nkrumah was born in about 1909 in Nkroful, Gold Coast. Although his mother, whose name was Nyanibah, later stated his year of birth was 1912, Nkrumah wrote that he was born on 18 September 1909, a Saturday, and by the naming customs of the Akan people was given the name Kwame, that being the name given to males born on a Saturday. During his years as a student in the United States, though, he was known as Francis Nwia Kofi Nkrumah, with Kofi being the name given to males born on Friday. The name of his father is not known; most accounts say he was a goldsmith. According to Ebenezer Obiri Addo in his study of the future president, the name "Nkrumah", a name traditionally given to a ninth child, indicates that Kwame likely held that place in the house of his father, who had several wives. Kwame, though, was the only child of his mother.

Nkroful was a small village, in the far southwest of the Gold Coast, close to the frontier with the French colony of the Ivory Coast. His father did not live with the family, but worked in Half Assini before his death while Kwame was a boy. Kwame Nkrumah was raised by his mother and his extended family, who lived together in traditional fashion, with more distant relatives often visiting. He lived a carefree childhood, spent in the village, in the bush, and on the nearby sea.

Nkrumah's mother sent him to the elementary school run by a Catholic mission at Half Assini, where he proved an adept student. He progressed through the ten-year elementary programme in only eight. By about 1925 he was a student-teacher in the school, and had been baptised into the faith. While at the school, he was noticed by the Reverend Alec Garden Fraser, principal of the Government Training College (soon to become Achimota School) in the Gold Coast's capital, Accra. Fraser arranged for Nkumrah to train as a teacher at his school. Here, Columbia-educated deputy headmaster Kwegyir Aggrey exposed him to the ideas of Marcus Garvey and W. E. B. Du Bois. Aggrey, Fraser, and others at Achimota taught that there should be close co-operation between the races in governing the Gold Coast, but Nkrumah, echoing Garvey, soon came to believe that only when the black race governed itself could there be harmony between the races.

After graduating from Achimota in 1930, Nkrumah was given a teaching post at the Catholic primary school in Elmina, and after a year there, was made headmaster of the school at Axim. In Axim, he started to get involved in politics and founded the Nzima Literary Society. In 1933, he was appointed a teacher at the Catholic seminary at Amissa. Although the life there was strict, he liked it, and Jesuit. Instead, he decided to further his education. Nkrumah had heard journalist and future Nigerian president Nnamdi Azikiwe speak while a student at Achimota; the two men met and Azikiwe's influence increased Nkrumah's interest in black nationalism. The young teacher decided to further his education. Azikiwe had attended Lincoln College, a historically black college in Chester County, Pennsylvania, west of Philadelphia, and he advised Nkrumah to enroll there. Nkrumah, who had failed the entrance examination for London University gained funds for the trip and his education from relatives. He travelled by way of Britain, where he learned, to his outrage, of Italy's invasion of Ethiopia, one of the few independent African nations. He arrived in the United States, in October 1935.

United States

According to historian John Henrik Clarke in his article on Nkrumah's American sojourn, "the influence of the ten years that he spent in the United States would have a lingering effect on the rest of his life." Nkrumah had sought entry to Lincoln some time before he began his studies there; on 1 March 1935, he had sent the school a letter noting that his application had been pending for more than a year.

When he arrived in New York in October 1935, he travelled to Pennsylvania, where he enrolled despite lacking the funds for the full semester. However, he soon won a scholarship that provided for his tuition at Lincoln. Nevertheless, he remained short on money through his time in the United States. To make ends meet, he worked in menial jobs, including as a dishwasher. On Sundays, he visited black Presbyterian churches in Philadelphia and in New York.

As a student in the United States, Nkrumah proved successful, gaining a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and sociology in 1939. Lincoln then appointed him an assistant lecturer in philosophy, and he began to receive invitations to be a guest preacher in Presbyterian churches in both Philadelphia and New York. In 1939, Nkrumah enrolled both at Lincoln's seminary and at the Ivy League University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He gained a Bachelor of Theology degree from Lincoln in 1942, the top student in the course, and earned from Penn the following year both a Master of Arts degree in philosophy and a Master of Science in education.

Nkrumah spent his summers in Harlem, a center of black life and thought. He found housing and employment in New York City with difficulty and involved himself in the community. He spent many evenings listening to and arguing with street orators, and according to Clarke,

These evenings were a vital part of Kwame Nkrumah's American education. He was going to a university—the university of the Harlem Streets. This was no ordinary time and these street speakers were no ordinary men ...The streets of Harlem were open forums, presided over [by] master speakers like Arthur Reed and his protege Ira Kemp. The young Carlos Cook, founder of the Garvey oriented African Pioneer Movement was on the scene, also bringing a nightly message to his street followers. Occasionally Suji Abdul Hamid, a champion of Harlem labor, held a night rally and demanded more jobs for blacks in their own community ... This is part of the drama on the Harlem streets as the student, Kwame Nkrumah walked and watched.

Nkrumah was an activist student, organizing a group of expatriate African students in Pennsylvania and building it into the African Students Association of America and Canada, becoming its president. Some members felt that the group should aspire for each colony to gain independence on its own; Nkrumah urged a Pan-African strategy. Nkrumah played a major role in the Pan-African conference held in New York in 1944, which urged the United States, at the end of the Second World War, to help ensure Africa became developed and free.

His old teacher, Aggrey, had died in 1929 in the United States, and in 1942, Nkrumah led traditional prayers for Aggrey at the gravesite. This led to a break between him and Lincoln, though after he rose to prominence in the Gold Coast, he returned in 1951 to accept an honorary degree. Nevertheless, Nkrumah's doctoral thesis remained uncompleted. He had adopted the forename Francis while at the Amissa seminary; in 1945 he took the name Kwame Nkrumah.

Just as in the days of the Egyptians, so today God had ordained that certain among the African race should journey westwards to equip themselves with knowledge and experience for the day when they would be called upon to return to their motherland and to use the learning they had acquired to help improve the lot of their brethren . . . I had not realized at the time that I would contribute so much towards the fulfillment of this prophecy. 

Kwame Nkrumah, The Autobiography of Kwame Nkrumah(1957)

Nkrumah read books about politics and divinity, and tutored students in philosophy. In 1943 Nkrumah met Trinidadian Marxist C. L.R. James,Russian expatriate Raya Dunayevskaya, and Chinese-American Grace Lee Boggs, all of whom were members of an American-based Trotskyist intellectual cohort. Nkrumah later credited James with teaching him "how an underground movement worked". Federal Bureau of Investigation files on Nkrumah, kept from January to May 1945, identify him as a possible Communist. Nkrumah was determined to go to London, wanting to continue his education there now that the Second World War had ended. James, in a 1945 letter introducing Nkrumah to Trinidad-bornGeorge Padmore in London, wrote: "this young man is coming to you. He is not very bright, but nevertheless do what you can for him because he's determined to throw Europeans out of Africa.”

London

Nkrumah returned to London in May 1945 and enrolled at the London School of Economics as a PhD candidate in anthropology. He withdrew after one term and the next year enrolled at University College, with the intent to write a philosophy dissertation on "Knowledge and Logical Positivism". His supervisor, A. J. Ayer, declined to rate Nkrumah as a “first-class philosopher”, saying, “I liked him and enjoyed talking to him but he did not seem to me to have an analytical mind. He wanted answers too quickly. I think part of the trouble may have been that he wasn't concentrating very hard on his thesis. It was a way of marking time until the opportunity came for him to return to Ghana.” Finally, Nkrumah enrolled in, but did not complete, a study in law at Gray's Inn. 

Nkrumah spent his time on political organising. He and Padmore were among the principal organizers of the Fifth Pan-African Congress in Manchester. The congress elaborated a strategy for supplanting colonialism with African socialism. They agreed to pursue a federal United States of Africa, with interlocking regional organizations, governing through separate states of limited sovereignty. They planned to pursue a new African culture without tribalism, democratic within a socialist or communist system, synthesizing traditional aspects with modern thinking, and for this to be achieved by nonviolent means if possible. Among those who attended the congress were the venerable W.E.B. Dubois and some who later took leading roles in leading their nations to independence, including Hastings Banda of Nyasaland (which became Malawi) and Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya.

The congress sought to establish ongoing African activism in Britain in conjunction with the West African National Secretariat (WANS) to work towards the decolonization of Africa. Nkrumah became the secretary of WANS. In addition to seeking to organise Africans to gain their nations' freedom, Nkrumah sought to succor the many West African seamen who had been stranded, destitute, in London at the end of the war, and established a Coloured Workers Association to empower and succor them. Both the U.S. State Department and MI5 watched Nkrumah and the WANS, focusing on their links with Communism. Nkrumah and Padmore established a group called The Circle to lead the way to West African independence and unity; the group aimed to create a Union of African Socialist Republic. A document from The Circle, setting forth that goal, was found on Nkrumah upon his arrest in Accra in 1948, and was used against him by the British authorities.

THE NOBEL LAUREATES OF AFRICA

Not many are familiar with the origin and history of one of the world's most prestigious awards, the NOBEL PRIZE. Very well organised and awarded to people who have had the most amazing effect on the world at large in various fields namely, Economics, Peace, Medicine, Physics, Literature, and Chemistry.

A great number of recipients (about 900, including individuals and organizations since inception to 2015) have emerged form various parts of the world for the various categories thereof. It comes with a somewhat huge cash prize and prestige in appreciation for impression on the world.

Amongst many things, ALFRED NOBEL was an inventor. Born on 21 October 1833 in Sweden, into a family of engineers. Nobel amassed a fortune during his lifetime, with most of his wealth from his 355 inventions, of which DYNAMITE is the most famous.
In 1888, Nobel was greatly shocked to read his own obituary, titled the merchant of death is dead, in a french newspaper. As it was his brother who had died. Nobel was disconcerted by this and he came apprehensive as to how he would be remembered when he passes on.

It was in this light, Nobel stated specifically in his will that his fortune be used to create a prize for those who confer the "greatest benefits on mankind" in Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, Peace, (and Economics). After consideration of his will, the award of the Nobel prize begin in the year 1901.

Africa has produced 22 worthy recipients of this esteemed award. We will consider these exceptional people and what stood them out in their various fields.

Come along, let us inspire Africa and Africans with our own brightest that have graced the world's stage by their life choices and work!

QUOTE OF THE DAY

AYODELE AWOJOBI - THE AFRICAN INTELLECTUAL GENIUS FROM NIGERIA

Whether educational, intellectual, political, entertainment, business, medical or otherwise, role models emerge from every part of a nation and its composite parts. These role models play a huge part in grooming the youths of any society as they aspire to be like them or surpass their deeds. They are looked up to for inspiration and motivation for personal growth or showed off as the nation's pride. Role models may not be titled leaders but, they are people who found their purpose, lived it fully and by their lives, help others in finding "the way"

The decibel to which the praises of role models are sung, I think should be proportional to their patriotism, selfless contribution, personal achievements. Some transcend national to becoming international icons, continental figures or a world class reference and they should be accorded the respect as it is.

In a continent as ours, where education is still a huge struggle and not much has been done in terms of effort to educate the people en mass, it is very necessary to loudly celebrate Academicians who have left a mark in time so they can be a very near form of inspiration for the children and youths. More so, with the short supply of quality leaders, it is most essential to celebrate leaders with exceptional positive contributions to societal growth.

On the subject, Ayodele Awojobi a Nigerian man stood out in his days as a genius, yes, a GENIUS. Born on March 12 1937, Ayodele was many things. From an excellent academician, an activist, an author, an inventor, and one who was drawn to politics. His brilliance was spoken of beyond the shores of his home country. And his commitment to a better society through education was unmatched.

Ayodele was a straight-A's secondary school student, while at the CMS Grammar school, passing his West African School Certificate examinations with a record eight distinctions in 1955. He proceeded to the Nigerian College of Arts, Science and Technology, Ibadan, for his General Certificate of Examinations, GCE (Advanced Level), where in 1958 he sat for, and obtained distinctions in all his papers: Physics, Pure Mathematics and Applied Mathematics. In 1962 Awojobi was awarded his first degree in Mechanical Engineering – a BSc (Eng) London, with first class honours, at the then Nigerian College of Arts, Science and Technology, Zaria (now Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria). He had studied there on a federal government scholarship won on the merit of his performance in the GCE (Advanced-level) examinations of 1958.

He boasted openly saying that it was his intention to finish the whole course within a period of three years only; an impracticable feat due to the fact that nowhere was the BSc Mechanical Engineering curriculum designed to run less than four years. Ayodele accomplished it in three years just as he had predicted.

The federal government awarded Awojobi another scholarship in 1962 to study further at the post-graduate level in the field of Mechanical Engineering at the Imperial College of the University of London (now Imperial College London). He completed the course, successfully defending his thesis, and was awarded a PhD in Mechanical Engineering in 1966.

Awojobi went to London to study for his Doctorate and was awarded the degree of Doctor of Science, DSc. He was the first African to be awarded the Doctor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering, at the Imperial College London. To have received the award at the age of 37 is significant, more so as the degree is only exceptionally and rarely awarded to a scholar under the age of 40

The status of the degree has declined, however, because it is not widely understood but in former times the doctorate in science was regarded as a greater distinction than a professorial chair. It is in fact a higher tier of research doctorates, awarded on the basis of a formally submitted portfolio of published research of a very high standard. 

He returned to Nigeria in 1974 and was made an associate professor in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Lagos. However, one week after having been appointed associate professor, the University of Lagos Senate, after receiving news that Awojobi had just been awarded the degree of Doctor of Science (DSc), immediately appointed him professor in Mechanical Engineering, making him the youngest professor in the Faculty of Engineering, University of Lagos and the first ever to be expressly promoted from associate to full professorship within a week.

^{By nature, Ayodele Awojobi was a teacher as he sought to increase the literacy rate of the citizens in his nation.} He engaged with great educators of his, and earlier generations, such as the late nationalist and Yoruba leader, Obafemi Awolowo (who forwarded several of Ayodele's educational books).

He imparted knowledge at various other levels, even as he contended with his day job as a full-time professor and university lecturer. He envisaged his country as a whole becoming more advanced, technologically – this was exemplified when he refused lucrative offers from commercial outfits for his Autonov 1 invention, he rather preferring to preserve his design for his country's future benefit.

^{Awojobi was a very vocal activist who spoke against electoral fraud and in a case, dragged the federal government to court in 1966 over electoral malpractice and rigging. He went from school to school giving speeches and handing out his books.}

With such a vibrant resume and more, I can only but wonder why AYODELE AWOJOBI's name is not loudly mentioned in the spheres where he made his mark, and I am very particular about education. Why is it that so little of this academic giant and his achievements are rarely known by this generation? How is it that we live in a society where thieves are loudly celebrated and rascals are immortalized?
We much change this and begin telling our stories, telling them strong, telling them long!