Prof. Olukunle Iyanda at 85: A Leader’s Legacy is People, not Monuments
By Tunde Ojo
Prof. Olukunle Iyanda is a globally recognised academic with an extensive list of accolades. His leadership in serving both the academia and industry could fill books or warrant a monument erected in his name. However, as inspiring as that reputation is, it is his humanity — better described as humaneness — that makes him endlessly endearing.
Here is an intellectual giant without pretentions, who has transformed a simple lifestyle into an art form. He is a well-branded Ibadan man with tribal marks, yet free from provincial tendencies. A refined gentleman, both in substance and style. A man with a strong sense of fairness and justice. A God-fearing individual. A great mentor and role model. He turns 85 today.
I owe God an eternal debt of gratitude for bringing us together. God brought him into my life at a most crucial time, both academically and in other life-shaping events. I will mention one or two, trusting that they are sufficient enough to paint, at best, a sketchy portrait of his noble spirit.
In 1980, armed with my recently released Higher School Certificate with high points, which qualified me for admission into the University of Lagos to study Mass Communication, I travelled to Lagos for the first time, highly confident of success in processing my admission.
I returned to Ibadan with the certainty of finding my name on the admission list in due time. The first list was released, and my name was missing from it. I waited for the second list. When it came out, my name was still missing. My idealism about university admission based on merit evaporated. The image of the nation I grew up in, where merit mattered, had crumbled, and a new, yet grim, reality of Nigeria was dawning on me. A nightmare at noon. Who do I turn to? Where do I go next? My mind raced with endless questions, and answers seemed very distant. My father had never needed to ask anyone for help to get me into any educational institution, I thought. He never believed in it. For example, he put me on a bus alone to travel to Ado-Ekiti to attend the admission examination of Christ School, the longest journey of my teenage life.
I returned to Ibadan. Thanks to my mother, a woman who never spent a day in school for formal education (by the way, that’s how to phrase it if you don’t want to call your dear mother an “illiterate”), but who is a strong advocate for education. I collected a letter from Chief Oshunkunle, a highly influential and benevolent government official in Ibadan, addressed to Prof. Olukunle Iyanda. Upon receiving the letter (which I had never bothered to read), Prof. Iyanda instructed me to write a petition to the Vice Chancellor, attach a copy of my results, and submit a copy of the letter to him, leaving the rest to his discretion. I shivered at the thought of writing a petition to the Vice Chancellor. Although I had read some literature on protest and resistance, I was not prepared to start my university education on a note of activism, but he insisted, so I yielded.
Weeks passed.
While the waiting endured, I secured a job as an English and literature-in-English teacher in a village secondary school near Ibadan. I was just about to settle into the apartment I had been allocated when my admission came through. My name was on the supplementary list.
What did Prof. Iyanda find? My file was labeled “awaiting results.” Someone in the admissions office had ripped my results sheets from my file, perhaps with a sinister plan to replace me with another candidate. God used Prof. Iyanda’s intervention to save my admission. I was introduced to his sense of justice and integrity, which I later came to know is the hallmark of the Iyanda family.
That episode could have changed the course of my life and career. From then on, I became a member of the Iyanda family. And that has come with enormous privileges.
I lived in their boys’ quarters at Ozolua Road on the University campus and ate their food for free as both an undergraduate and a postgraduate, and even after I started my career as a young advertising executive.
Prof. (whom I call uncle) and his amiable wife, Aunty Omotola, never placed a burden on me. I was an “S.U.” (Scripture Union) Christian, full of exuberant faith in their home, but they never imposed on my conscience. They welcomed my fiancée, Adora (Ada), a girl from another tribe, into the family, despite my mother’s difficulty in understanding the reasoning behind her son’s decision to marry an Igbo girl.
The entire Iyanda family played a significant role when Adora and I got married. All of them were there for us, providing support in both cash and kind. It was shortly before my wedding that I moved out of their accommodation. As if that was not enough, Prof. Iyanda ensured that my wife got a job as a teacher with the Lagos State Government, where she built a highly fulfilling and award-winning career. Before then, she had been job hunting for about three years.
Uncle and Aunty Omotola were great role models of family values and intentional childrearing; their children are all successful.
You can never be close to him without knowing what separates intellectuals from the rest of the world. When I asked him for books for my admission to post-graduate studies in Mass Communication with a specialisation in PR and Advertising, I was expecting marketing books. Still, he gave me The Republic of Plato and advised that all I needed first was to learn to how to think. The Republic is one of my prized possessions today.
One day, while still living with them, I came down with hepatitis, and it could have claimed my life. I will never forget how Prof. and Aunty took over my medical care at the university health centre and paid the bills. Without them being the extended hands of God, I would not have had the opportunity to write this tribute. I am grateful.
When it comes to leadership legacy, leaders often envision projects or monuments as memorials of their achievements. However, Dan Owolabi, the Executive Director of Branches Worldwide, offered a different perspective. Speaking on this topic at the Global Leadership Summit (GLS) in Chicago last August, he urged the audience of around 7,000 leaders to consider the question, “Who is my legacy?” instead of “What is my legacy?”
In addition to his academic laurels and numerous accomplishments, Prof. Olukunle Iyanda’s leadership legacy is the people that he has raised, and they are not limited to his students.
I believe that I am one of them.
Wow! Wow! Wow! This is the first time I will be reading the full gist of your relationship with Prof Iyanda. What an interesting story! Thanks for sharing. Prof is my father’s friend, even though he is much younger than my father but they used to call each other by their first names. Thank God for his life!
Tunde.
Beautiful MasterPiece.
I thought I know Tunde Ojo very well but this “legacy” piece has given me more “info” about Omo Boy. Watch out for when and how I will use this “orijo” you have just given.
Prof Iyanda is synonymous with Unilag Mass-Com. Quite a number of Akokites have said wonderful things about him. Your piece is a wrap up of a man who truly cares about others.
We pray for long life in good health.
Tunde you are a legacy legend.
The lines have fallen, almost tempted to write that the lines have always fallen for you and around you in pleasant places.
Thanks again for enlightening us about legacy that lives and still living through others.
May his tribe continue to increase.
Adewumi Alabi
Super job sir! Prof Iyanda is in deed a great and good man – hence this mind blowing write up by you.
Happy 85th birthday to Prof Iyanda! God bless and preserve him and grant him divine health and continous sound mind and prosperity physically and spiritually all the days of his life in Jesus Name. Amen 🙏
Links. Prof was our hall master at Eni- Njoku Unilag. He and his son never missed our football matches. He took me as a son and I was an hero to his boy. We got along pretty well. I was always welcome to his home where I met the wife and other daughters.
This is an awesome testimony. I agree with every word therein. Tunde, thanks for this
So the problem of Nigeria didn’t start today? Wicked persons truncating the joy of many, so unfortunate.
Thank God for men of honour like Prof. May God continue to bless him and keep him in good health.
You better believe it. Thank you for your response and prayers for Prof. Iyanda.
The boss…. I duff for your writing prowess. Reading this, I felt like a child sipping a chilled ice-cream that should never finish. God bless Prof Iyanda. Indeed, only a legacy could have penned this legacy. The boss raised many legacies, I believe I am one of them
Huge thanks, Ibrahim. I am grateful for your generous comments and feel blessed to have worked with you. Few professionals can combine intelligence with integrity. Perhaps we should not call them professionals at all.
My mentor, the one that matriculated me as student in the Department of Accounting University of Lagos in 1984. I greet you sir. More of God’s grace and blessings.May you age graciously and in good health. May your labour of raising men and women not be in vein. You will surely receive the reward of what impact in the life of thousands of the students that pass through you both in Nigeria and outside Nigeria. Have blessed birthday. Congratulations
We thank God for his intervention in your admission. Heb. 13:8- Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever. He will continue to guide your life and career to fulfill destiny. I loved Prof Iyanda from afar and am grateful that his intellect also showed in his affection for people. I know that his children too will find help wherever they go. We need to challenge ourselves and ensure Christians occupy decision tables in the public sector. Shalom
As you have said, intelligence and compassion are not mutually exclusive. I agree with your thesis. Thanks.
This is highly inspiring!!! Thank you for sharing. Truly, a person’s true legacy is NOT in monuments, but in the lives one has positively touched!!!
HAPPY 85th. Birthday to Papa – PROFESSOR OLUKUNLE IYANDA 🙌🙌
Best wishes for many wonderfully glorious returns in all-round good health, and GOD’s grace to continue to bear fruits of positive impact on lives, even in old age, and Mama too; in the Name of JESUS CHRIST, Amen!!! 🙌🙌🙏🙏
Indeed, “A Leader’s Legacy is People, not Monuments.”
Indeed, God’s Angels come in different forms and deliveries. As a beneficiary of Prof’s humaneness, replicating his mould to vast majority of ‘next gen’ with hazy future, would be best of ideals. I trust that this path of life you’re already treading.
Building men and not monuments used to be the primary focus of the church, this was evident with the documented details of records of service of our Savior Jesus Christ, until ministry bricklayers took the center stage, distributing crumbs as welfarism while they live in oppulence. (It is a topic for another season).
Thank God for Prof. Iyanda and his mentee who has chosen not to be ‘abaraámóoreje’. The best celebration befitting the Prof is one accorded him while he is still on this side of eternity.
Happy birthday to Prof.
Your thoughts are as inspiring as they are challenging. There are many things to learn from the life of Jesus, who modelled self-sacrificing love. Thanks for your thoughts, sir.
Sir, this tribute beautifully captures the essence of Prof. Olukunle Iyanda’s legacy—not just as a distinguished academic but as a mentor and a man of deep integrity. The heartfelt narrative, enriched with personal anecdotes, paints a compelling picture of a leader whose impact is measured in lives transformed rather than monuments built. You masterfully conveyed Prof. Iyanda’s unwavering sense of justice, generosity, and commitment to nurturing others. This tribute is both a fitting honor and an inspiring testimony to the power of leadership rooted in humanity. It isn’t just a celebration of an academic giant but a masterclass in how to honor a life that has shaped others. Well done!
Dotun Anthony Akinsulire, thanks for your rave review of this understated tribute to a real leader and hero. Your write-up speaks to your power of language as a purveyor of deep thoughts. I celebrate you, rabbi. May your pen never run dry, or your keyboard never get jammed. Huge appreciation.
What a great treatise on a great benefactor you have here, Sir.
The short piece is a great ulalation or, better,a great adulation on someone worthy of emulation in terms of intellectual quality with profound,prodigious knowledge, which Professor Iyanda personifies.
Interestingly,I got to know Professor Iyanda faintly through a close friend of mine that we did A levels together at the Federal School of Arts & Science(FSAS)in Victoria Island who whilst I was admitted to study that great discipline,Mass Communication,was admitted for Business Administration at the prestigious University of Lagos.
He was the one who first spoke glowingly about the intellectual depth of Prof. Iyanda to me as a great academic.
Anyway,you are a good example of one who deeply appreciates the kindness one’s benefactor has bestowed on one no matter how long the benefit had been extended(e ki ise abara mo ore je as the popular Yorba proverb says)
Permit me by this to extend my eternal appreciation of your support and kindness to me, too, and by extension to my outfit.
In 2002 April when God newly formed Mediapro Consulting Ltd for me,and my papers were yet to be supplied by the CAC in Abuja,you surprised me by not only giving me our first job which was a quarter page black&white material in the Guardian of a particular day in that same month of April,2002,you went ahead to issue the 8,400 naira job in my name Taiwo Osunsanya to show how much you valued me and the level of integrity you placed on me.
This,I will never forget in my life,as such,I am hereby extending to you my eternal appreciation.
God bless you unending for this in Jesus’ name.
I will conclude these short comments by saying that just like Professor Iyanda is a good man,you are equally one as well.
May the Lord continually bless Professor Iyanda,preserve him for many years in the land of the living, and above all bless him with his eternal kingdom at the end of his earthly race in Jesus’ name🙏
My dear brother. I am highly overwhelmed by your kind words for Prof. Iyanda and huge encouragement for me. Who are we, if not for the unfailing grace of God? We are of no reputations outside of what God has accomplished in Christ. Thank you immensely. Sola Gratia! (Grace alone!)
A beautiful tribute to a selfless Professor and his beloved wife. We give thanks to God for the open doors He provides.