How did your interest in academics start?
In my secondary school, my teachers were of the opinion that I would go to the university to study Medicine and Surgery because I was the best student in my set. Initially, it was an unconscious thing because it was my teachers who saw my potentials. But later, consciously I started considering Medicine and Surgery as my choice of course in the university. However, I have come to believe that all things work together for good, and God has a way of leading His children into the way that He has ordained for them, even though they may wish to go otherwise. To pursue my interest in Medicine and Surgery, I wrote my first Joint Admission Matriculation Board (JAMB) examination in 1984, but couldn’t make the cut-off mark for the course. As a result, I was admitted for Botany in Obafemi Awolowo University. At first, I didn’t want to accept the admission, but along the line, coupled with the fact that I didn’t want to continue staying at home, I decided to accept the offer, on the condition that I was going to retake JAMB to change to Medicine and Surgery. I actually did that. Again, having one or two marks less than the cut-off, I could not make the merit list and there was nobody to help with, perhaps, discretionary admission. I continued with Botany in my first year, but planned to rewrite JAMB in year two. As before, with a margin of one or two marks, I was not able to make the merit list for Medicine and Surgery and there was nobody to help. By this time, I was already in part two, going to part three, with just two years to graduation. So, I decided to graduate as a botanist, but with plans to cross to Medicine and Surgery or Pharmacy for another degree. I graduated from Botany in 1988 and I went to serve. Between 1988 and 1989, there was a Minister for Education, I can’t remember the name now, that insisted that anybody who already had a first degree should not be allowed to go back to the university to have another first degree. That was how my idea of coming back for Medicine or Pharmacy just went off. Because I finished my first degree at a young age, 20, and didn’t want to stay at home, with the idea of coming back for Medicine and Surgery or Pharmacy not materialising, I decided to go for my Masters, and Ph.D. respectively. It was in-between my Masters and Ph.D. that I started falling in love with Botany. Eventually, I concluded that God has His way of working His plans out in the lives of His children. Botany was what God wanted me to study, even when it wasn’t my choice at all. Many other things along the line proved to me that this is actually the path God had wanted me to follow.
Why did it take you that long before picking interest in Botany?
Yes, it took me that long because, I would say, my desires were different from what I got then. Except for when I was in Biology classes, I had never heard anything about Botany at all. Apart from knowing it is a study of plants in my secondary school, I knew nothing else about it, let alone knowing people studying it in the university. Another thing about secondary school is that parents and teachers stereotype a brilliant and biologically-inclined student in the sciences to Medicine and Surgery; the mathematically-inclined to Engineering; and a brilliant student in the arts to Law. All these have a way of shaping our world view, not minding if our interest lies in something else. The society streamlines. So it took me that long because at the beginning Botany, wasn’t just my idea of course choice nor a career path to tow. I must say that this affected my results initially. Over the years, I have had to counsel students who, without choosing Botany, have found themselves in the Department. I make them realise what I have come to understand over the years that the world is not looking for any course in particular but what the world is looking for is excellence.
What lesson could be gleaned from the failed efforts at getting to Medicine and Surgery and Pharmacy?
God has a way of doing or arranging things in the lives of His children. Out of His love, if God wants one to follow a path in which one’s interest is not, what He will do is to block the other paths so that the only path remaining is the one He wants one to follow. If not, I still don’t believe up till today that I couldn’t give what was required to get admitted into Medicine and Surgery.
Having presented the 335th Inaugural Lecture in OAU as a Botanist, how do you feel now?
I feel accomplished! I am now convinced God wanted me in Botany in OAU, especially because of the number of firsts that He has helped me to make. I am the first female professor in OAU Botany; first female HOD in Botany; the first female vice-dean for the Faculty of Science since its inception in 1962; and the first female Dean for the same faculty. As a woman in the sciences, I became a professor when one wouldn’t think it was possible, just 16 years into my lecturing career. I was appointed in 1995, and over the years, God has helped me. I got all my promotions as and when due to the glory of God.
With all these trailblazing records, how is the home front?
Being dutifully brought up by my mother, I learnt from her that the home is the topmost priority of a woman. I’ve never had any house help and I had all my children when I was on my Ph.D. programme. Being able to work under pressure, combining so many things without any help at that early stage as a wife, mother, student, and lecturer, fortified me to lead the largest Faculty in OAU at this time. I would not have been happy if I had risen to the peak of my career at the expense of my home. My husband and my children have always been my priority. I am most grateful to my husband for always supporting and encouraging me. He is also an academic, a Professor of Law. I was always on ground to assist my children with their home works and to study with them. I have three children and they are doing well to the glory of God.
What is your good moment?
As an academic, honestly, my good moment is when I have just published an academic paper. As a wife and mother, my good moment is seeing my husband and children making progress in all areas of their lives
Low moments?
To be sincere, my low moments are when I think of what I could have done in my lab and the labs within the university but could not because the equipment and the facilities are just not there.
What is your challenge to the young women struggling out there to break even?
To the married young women there, make your home your priority. If your career is the priority, there is the tendency to get to the peak of your career at the expense of your home. It is extremely important for you to be there for your children when they are growing up, most especially between ages 1-10 years. The bonding you have with them during this time is likely to be a lasting one and this is actually the period when you can really correct and shape them. I am of the opinion that, as women, we can reach the peak of our careers through hard work, prayers and determination, without the home front suffering.
and then