BY DAYO ADESULU
With heavy heart has Professor Peter Okebukola, the former Executive Secretary, National Universities Commission, decried the death of his role model, Professor ‘Folabi Olumide.
Professor ‘Folabi Olumide, the foundation vice-chancellor of Lagos State University passed on Friday at the age of 81.
Okebukola with a heavy heart and deep sorrow said: ”The sad news, broken today, January 8, 2021, of the death of Professor ‘Folabi Olumide, the foundation vice-chancellor of Lagos State University at the age of 81, is one that piles on the sour narratives of the first week of this year with the loss of two other top university administrators.
”For me, Professor ‘Folabi Olumide’s death is particularly heartrending being the vice-chancellor when I joined the services of Lagos State University as a foundation staff in 1984 and who for 37 years tutored me in leadership and was a role model in several respects.
”An internationally well-regarded surgeon, scholar, lover of music, art, poetry with great dress sense, Professor Olumide gave LASU a solid start in academic and physical developments and crafted the template on which many of the successor vice-chancellors situated their strategic plans.
”The LASU College of Medicine, among other far-sighted academic initiatives, was a product of his vision. He did not compromise on quality and he demonstrated a high taste for excellence.
”He was a man who kept all angles covered as chairman of the senate and who, though diplomatic in general approach and comportment, did not spare persons with divisive tendencies.
”His maxim was: “To make LASU great is a task that must be done”. He doggedly led efforts to pursue this goal in spite of all odds.
”He must be fulfilled that today as he goes home to glory, LASU met his dream of being a great university with high international repute especially driven in the last five years by the efforts of the 8th Vice-Chancellor, Professor Olanrewaju Adigun Fagbohun who bows out in style on January 11.
”My deepest condolence to the Olumide Family and to the LASU community. May his soul rest in perfect peace.”
