I was at Afe Babalola University, Ado Ekiti, yesterday for an important function. I felt proud of what one man can do, and angry at what government has failed to do.
The Ado/Ijan Road, now known as “Afe Babalola Way,” is an eyesore. It serves a Federal Polytechnic, a world-class private university, the Ekiti Golf Club, an agricultural settlement, and multiple government establishments. Yet neither the Federal Government nor the Ekiti State Government has treated it as a priority. For 16 years since ABUAD was established, this critical corridor has been left to rot. This is not just bad infrastructure. It is ingratitude.
Chief Afe Babalola, SAN, is Ekiti’s most significant living contribution to Nigeria and the world. A local boy who conquered the legal profession and was recognized by leaders, including Queen Elizabeth II. At 97, he has built what no government in Nigeria has matched.
Over the past sixteen years, he has created employment and opportunity on a scale that rivals the state itself. ABUAD currently employs more than 2,500 academic and non-academic staff, with over 5,000 additional support staff working as cleaners, artisans, drivers, farm hands, and others. That employment base has turned the institution into one of the largest private employers in Ekiti.
The university’s impact has not gone unnoticed. It has been ranked No. 1 in Nigeria by Times Higher Education for four consecutive years, 2022 to 2025, No. 3 in Africa, and No. 84 globally on impact ratings. Those rankings reflect not just academic output but the university’s role in advancing healthcare, research, and community development.
In healthcare, ABUAD operates a Multi-system Hospital (AMSH) that has become a referral center for the country. The hospital runs an MRI unit, CT-Scanners, Digital X-Ray machines, 17 dialysis machines, and has performed over 400 dialysis procedures. Just two weeks ago, more renal transplants were successfully performed to make a total of 50 renal transplants carried out without complications for donors or recipients in ABUAD. The center also performs cardio-thoracic surgeries and runs an IVF clinic.
Beyond the hospital, Chief Afe Babalola established the Afe Abiye free antenatal program for women in Ekiti State, a model similar to Ondo’s Mother and Child scheme, ensuring that thousands of women receive care without cost. He also established two hospital annexes at Odo Ado( Girigiri) and Basiri all within Ado Ekiti.
His philanthropic contributions to Federal Polytechnic, Ado Ekiti and Ekiti State University coupled with yearly empowerment programmes for Ekiti State farmers, traders, artisans and scholarships for students are monumental.
Where government infrastructure has failed, ABUAD stepped in. The university runs an independent power plant not connected to the national grid, and a private dam that meets the water needs of the university and its farm. It also operates an industrial park with space for 126 factories, and a fully integrated farm that produces vegetables, fruits such as pepper, mangoes, papaya and tomatoes, livestock including birds, fish and other animals, and processed products like flour, cassava, plantain, rice, pepper, and cashew nuts for local consumption and export. The farm even has its own feed mill for livestock, and the institution is involved in recycling to sustain its operations.
The economic multiplier effect is evident. ABUAD attracts students from all 36 states and the FCT, as well as from countries including the US, China, and across Africa. To further open up the State, Chief Afe Babalola personally contributed N2 billion for landing equipment at the newly established Ekiti Cargo Airport and N450 million for the construction of its current car park.
This is what one man did for Ekiti without waiting for Abuja or Ado Ekiti. He even provided his house as the take-off administrative office for the State university at inception.
And what did Ekiti and the Federal Government do in return? They left the road to his university unmotorable.
Governor Biodun Oyebanji is widely regarded as an Omoluabi. Unlike two of his predecessors, he has publicly shown respect for Chief Afe Babalola, prostrating for him in line with Yoruba ethos. But respect without action is empty. Governor Oyebanji recently delivered a lecture at ABUAD, yet avoided the Ado/Ijan Road entirely and came through the bypass. That tells you everything.
President Bola Tinubu is an alumnus of ABUAD, having received an honorary doctorate from the university. The Federal Ministry of Works claimed to have awarded the road two years ago, then passed it to FERMA. Since then, silence. Nothing has been done.
So I ask; How does a country honour its heroes while they are alive? The best gift Ekiti State and the Federal Government can give Chief Afe Babalola at almost a century is not another plaque or title. It is to fix the 8.5km road that bears his name so he can drive on it, and so the students, patients, staff, and investors who keep ABUAD running don’t destroy their vehicles and waste their lives in traffic and dust.
Anything short of immediate resumption and completion of work on this road is a dent on Governor Oyebanji and Minister David Umahi. It tells the world that Nigeria celebrates its builders only in speeches, not in deeds.
Ekiti opened its doors to the world because of ABUAD. The least the world can expect in return is a road that works.
Fix Afe Babalola Way. Now. While the man can still see it.
*Oloroogun Sola Ajisafe, Lawyer/Journalist. He is from Oka Akoko, lives and practises law in Akure, Ondo State.
