The Senate of the University of Lagos (UNILAG), Akoka, Nigeria on Monday announced Professor Folasade Ogunsola as the new acting vice chancellor. She was elected by members of the Senate at an emergency meeting held on Monday, thereby breaking UNILAG’s 58-year record by becoming the first female to be appointed as an acting VC of the institution since it was founded in 1962.
Ogunsola until this announcement was the deputy vice-chancellor in charge of development services and the first female to be so appointed in the history of the University of Lagos. She defeated her opponent and a deputy vice-chancellor in charge of management services, Ben Oghojafor, with a wide margin. She scored 135 votes as against Oghojafor’s 31 among the senate members. A total of 167 professors were accredited for voting while one vote was voided.
Ogunsola, a professor of medical microbiology, was also the first female provost of the university’s college of medicine, Idi-Araba. BusinessDay report shows that Ogunsola’s election follows the request made by the Visitor to the University, President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday 21st August, 2020. Buhari had intervened in a lingering crisis between the Governing Council of the University and its Senate when he ordered the suspension of the Acting Vice Chancellor appointed by the Governing Council, Omololu Soyombo.
Sixty-two-year-old Ogunsola is a Professor of Clinical Microbiology. She is also the first female provost of the College of Medicine, University of Lagos. She became the Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Development Services) of the institution since 2017.
According to her citation on Havard’s website, Ogunsola’s research interest and work centred around the diagnosis and prevention of infectious diseases and antibiotic resistance. She has, for two decades, been involved in raising awareness on Infection Control in Nigeria. She was a founding member of the Nigerian Society for Infection Control in 1998 and has assisted in setting up infection control programmes in institutions around the country and is the principal investigator at AIDS Prevention Initiative in Nigeria at UNILAG.
Source: The Punch
