Dr Olumuyiwa Igbalajobi: From advancing HIV treatment to championing advocacy against IELTS

The world over, philanthropists are known for making impact by giving back a portion of their monetary wealth to the society, but for Dr Olumuyiwa Igbalajobi, his currency of philanthropism is giving back a portion of his wealth of knowledge to a large pool of young Nigerians constantly in search of international opportunities that guarantee an exit out of the hustle life.

In over seven years, Igbalajobi has helped more than 20,000 Nigerians and non-Nigerians access scholarship opportunities overseas through his mentorship and his network in Europe and America, and he’s determined to do more.

In addition to that, Igbalajobi is gaining a new global reputation for his advocacy for the scrapping of the International English Language Testing System (IELTS).

IELTS, jointly managed by the British Council, IDP Australia and Cambridge Assessment, was introduced in 1989 and is compulsory for students planning to study in Uk, Canada, USA and Australia. Over the years, the compulsion of IELTS for students from Nigeria where English is the official language following the country’s colonisation by the British has sparked outrage that did not yield tangible results.

“We learn English in our schools from Kindergarten all the way to tertiary institutions. So if we go through all these, why do we still have to pay an amount that is almost thrice the minimum wage in Nigeria, and the result for this test expires every two years? It doesn’t just make sense,” says Ebenezer Wikina, Founder of Policy Shapers. 

The IELTS academic for Nigerians planning to study in the UK and Canada costs around ₦89,500. The general IELTS is between ₦79, 000 and ₦83,000 for the UK and Canada. 

A report by International Centre for Investigative Reporting in 2020 says Nigerians spend more than ₦5.15 billion every year to take IELTS, which its result is only valid for two years, and many continue to question the rationale behind the test.

In French-speaking African countries like Benin, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Chad, colonised by France, students going to study in France take the Diploma in Advanced and French Language (DALF) test, which costs $38 (₦16,000), and the result is valid forever.

Through Igbalajobi’s advocacy, the tide is gradually changing. In June 2022, when the University of Alberta, Canada, added Nigeria to the list of English-speaking countries through Igbalajobi’s effort, I took a keen interest in his work and wanted to know more.

The son of an emeritus professor in education, his passion for education springs from his background. 

From eight F9s in WAEC to a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of British Columbia.

Born in Ado-Ekiti, Ekiti State, Southwest Nigeria, about 321 km from Nigeria’s commercial hub, Lagos, Igbalajobi’s background played a crucial role in his academic success. His father, a Professor in Education, was a lecturer at the University of Maiduguri (UNIMAID). As a son of an academia, Igbalajobi grew up around books and discipline was instilled in him from childhood. From a young age, he started admiring his father’s career path and aspired to be a professor like him.

In 2002, when he wrote his secondary school certificate examination. It came as a shock to him and to many who knew his capacity when the results were released, and he failed all his subjects except mathematics, where he had a C5 grade. It took him 10 O-level sittings before he cleared his papers and secured admission into Ekiti State University. 

“I went to Christ’s School (Ado-Ekiti) for my high school, and I left Christ (School) in 2002. I didn’t get to enter the university until 2005. I had done over 10 sit-ins before I could enter the University,” Igbalajobi told me.

With that number of setbacks, most people would have concluded that education was not for them but not Igbalajobi. He has a dream of becoming a professor, and nothing could stand in the way, not even his O-level results.

Undeterred that some of his mates were on the verge of graduating from universities, he immersed himself in his studies when he got admitted to Ado-Ekiti to study Microbiology and would graduate in 2010 with a Second Class-Upper Division. But his academic success was not the only feat he achieved at the University. He was the President of the Nigerian Association of Microbiology Students (NAMS), Ado-Ekiti Chapter, and invested in building relationships and connections with people, which would prove valuable to him later in life. 

“I’ve invested a lot in relationships and networking, which brought about the Korean government scholarship,” he said.

Giving up has never been an option for Igbalajobi. He began his MSc degree shortly after graduation in 2010 and was six months into finishing the programme when a former senior colleague wrote to him about some scholarship opportunities. He sent applications to China and South Korea via NIPOST, and got the South Korean government Scholarship for his Masters’s Degree in Microbiology at Daejeon University, South Korea.

After his MSc in 2016, he got a PhD scholarship at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany, funded by the DFG grants, one of the most popular grants in Germany.

For over 14 years as an academia, Igbalajobi has conducted various research in the field of microbiology. Currently, he is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of British Columbia, where he is researching Cryptococcus neoformans, a fungus that causes cryptococcal meningitis, the fifth deadliest infectious disease. Cryptococcal meningitis is responsible for over 200,000 HIV-related cases each year, resulting in more than 180,000 deaths. Typically, his experiments focus on trying to repurpose anti-cancer drugs to treat infections caused by these fungi.

 

Campaign Against English Proficiency Test for English-speaking African Countries

Though Igbalajobi was not required to present any English Proficiency test when he moved to South Korea, he was surprised when one of his Twitter followers drew his attention to the fact that Alberta University, in his current country of residence, Canada, only exempts graduates from 35 Universities in Nigeria from providing the English Proficiency Test. Doubtfully, he visited the school’s website to find out that not only were 35 Universities, his own Alma Mater, which was changed from University of Ado-Ekiti to Ekiti State University in 2011, still bears the last name. 

“If you have studied in the 35 universities, you are exempted from submitting the English proficiency test. Funnily enough, my home university, Ekiti State University, was changed in 2011. I was inspired to write them an email to tell them that we do not have 35 universities in Nigeria. We have 160 universities, and that the list was stale and outdated,” he told me.

Acknowledging the discrepancies in the outed list, Alberta replied and added Nigeria to the list of English-speaking countries. 

Through that first email, a campaign was born. In just six months, Igbalajobi had written to over 40 Universities, and six Universities in Canada, and the US, have changed their policies so far. The Universities include the University of Alberta, Clemson University, University of Texas, Austin, University of Washington, Athabasca University and the University of Oregon.

In response to Igbalajobi’s email, the University of Oregon said that from spring 2023, they would no longer “require English-speaking African countries to submit the English test because they realise over time they’ve been marginalised.”

Igbalajobi’s resilience is gradually changing a barrier of over three decades that has prevented them from accessing global opportunities.

While some schools have insisted on not removing English tests as one of the requirements for Nigerians seeking admission to their institution, Igbalajobi said he is determined to make sure that this discrimination is stopped. 

“I feel it’s quite discriminatory if you exempt some English-speaking African countries like South Africa and Liberia from the English test, and you do not exempt countries like Nigeria,” Igbalajobi said.

“The proficiency test has been there as historical barriers that keep limiting people from assessing global opportunities. The funny thing about this language test is that it doesn’t even impact your English proficiency because you could be strategic to pass it.”

Igbalajobi equally pointed to the huge market size in Africa, particularly in Nigeria, where about seven in 10 Nigerians are planning to leave the country, as the reason why IELTS is being used as a criterion.

To make sure that this barrier is removed for English-speaking African countries, Igbalajobi has engaged Abike Dabiri-Erewa, Chairman of Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM),  and with Policy Shapers, a Non-governmental Organisation that is helping to champion ReformIELTS. Together they have engaged with Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Education to ensure that the movement on the proficiency test gathers more momentum.

Igbalajobi, privileged to be mentored by his “father, lecturers and other great people”, finds value in education and has resolved to give back to the community. He is helping young people seeking admission to fully know the requirements, reviewing their CVs and essays, mentoring, and providing timely scholarship opportunities. 

In his usual way of giving back to society, in April 2021, Igbalajobi wrote to Ekiti State University to apply as a visiting lecturer in the Microbiology department.

“I was motivated to serve my own University. I exclusively stated I didn’t want to be paid because I saw the need to mentor the young microbiologists,” he said.

“I feel there’s a need for me to give back in that way, to teach for free, and you know, in all my classes, I talk about scholarships and use my story to motivate my students. It was an amazing journey for me.”