By Ononye VC
Professor Anthony Alaba Akinwale, OP (Rev. Fr.) has been appointed as the pioneer Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Augustine University, Ilara-Epe, Lagos State.
His appointment was approved by the Institution’s Governing Council at its 34th meeting held on Wednesday, 23rd August, 2023.
The appointment was contained in a press statement issued by the Public Relations Officer of the Institution, Miss Moyinoluwa Ajayi, on Thursday, 24th August, 2023.
According to the press statement, the appointment of the new Deputy Vice-Chancellor took effect from Wednesday, 23rd August, 2023.
While congratulating the new DVC, the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Christopher Odetunde charged him to work assiduously to uplift the standard of the Institution in ensuring that Augustine University continues to soar higher in the community of Universities globally.
A Professor of Systematic Theology and Thomistic Philosophy, Professor Anthony Alaba Akinwale was born in Ebute Metta, Lagos, on 10 June, 1962. He had his nursery education at Mount Carmel Nursery School, Ebute Metta, Lagos (1966-68); primary education at St Paul’s Catholic School, Ebute Metta (1968-74) and secondary education at St Finbarr’s College, Akoka-Yaba, Lagos (1974-79). He made his first profession in the Order of Preachers on 27 September, 1981 and was ordained to the Catholic priesthood on 20 December, 1987.
Prior to his priestly ordination, he studied Philosophy at the Seminary of Ss. Peter and Paul, Bodija, Nigeria, and Theology at the Catholic Faculty of Theology, now known as the Catholic University of Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After his priestly ordination, he worked in the Catholic Diocese of Sokoto before proceeding to the Dominican University College in Ottawa, Canada, where he obtained his licentiate and master’s degrees in Theology in 1991. He obtained his Doctor of Philosophy degree in Systematic Theology at Boston College, USA in 1996.
During his doctoral studies, he began his teaching career at Boston College in 1993 and returned to Nigeria in 1996 to teach at the Dominican Institute where he rose to become Professor of Systematic Theology and Thomistic Philosophy in 2006. He served as pioneer Dean of Studies from 1996-2000 and President of the Dominican Institute from 2004-2016. Under his leadership, the Dominican Institute received full accreditation of its Philosophy programme from the National Universities Commission for two consecutive times.
Professor Akinwale is a scholar of national and international renown, and a proponent of qualitative education who has authored three books and currently preparing another for publication. He has co-edited three books and authored over 100 academic essays and conference papers in national and international journals. His writings are on religion, philosophy, history, politics and education. In July 2017, he was appointed by the Master of the Order of Preachers to serve on the Permanent Commission for the Promotion of Intellectual Life in the Order of Preachers. The Commission is composed of nine Dominican professors chosen from around the world and advises the Master of the Order on issues relating to the Order’s universities.
In August 2017, the Board of Trustees of the Dominican University appointed him pioneer Vice Chancellor of the Dominican University Ibadan, the first university of the Dominican Order in Africa and he completed his term as Vice Chancellor in August 2022.
Prior to his appointment as a Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Augustine University, he served as a Faculty Member in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies in same Institution.
