About four decades ago, precisely on Tuesday 9 January 1962, a young lady alighted at noon from a British Airways flight onto the tarmac of Lagos International Airport.

        As previously advised on the plane by a fellow passenger, she accosted the first taxi driver and asked to be taken to the nearest Roman Catholic Convent to request accommodation for one night. This turned out to be Our Lady of Apostles (O.L.A.) Convent in Maryland, Lagos.

        That apparently chance connection with an O.L.A. institution was to be renewed several times during the next eight years, culminating in the event of Thursday 19 November 1970 at Ibadan.

        That night of 9 January 1962, the first night in Nigeria for the young lady, she again boarded a taxi, this time from Maryland to Federal Palace Hotel, Ikoyi to have dinner with two delegates who were in Lagos for the Commonwealth Conference – Honourable Andrew Rose, uncle-in-law to some of her first cousins, (he had told her the week before to contact him on arrival in Lagos) and Honourable Norman Manley, well-known Jamaica politician, both of blessed memory.

        The latter, by the end of that week, was able to make his way from Lagos to Oyo, with his guide, Mrs. Frances Ademola, daughter-in-law of the late Chief Justice of the Federation of Nigeria. They wanted to see the sort of place the young lady was going to settle in. None of them was to know then, that she would be there for the next five years and nine months of her life.

        Back in Lagos on Wednesday 10 January 1962, the young lady made her way to the airport to board the plane for Ibadan. She was to be met there by the Parish Priest of the Catholic Church in Oyo town, Rev. Fr. Van den Hurk, a Dutch Priest in the Order of the White Fathers. As she entered his Volkswagen car and he trafficated right towards Oyo, he told her not to worry about the road to the left for then, as it would soon become very well known to her, since it led to Ibadan only 33 miles from Oyo, whose non-Nigerian inhabitants usually went there for their weekly shopping.

        Little did the young lady herself know that by October 1967 she would be resident in Ibadan, where she would go for the postgraduate course in Librarianship at the University of Ibadan. In addition, that was to lead to her meeting in 1970, at the University Library, her future husband, a charming young man, brilliant postgraduate scholar of Classics, who later became in 1981, not Professor of Classics, but Professor of African Folklore, a title borne only by him to date in the entire continent of Africa.

        By now, it must be obvious, that the young lady was Miss Audrey Bernice Charles, who having twice renewed her two-year contract on a teaching appointment at St. Bernardine’s Girls’ Grammar School, Oyo, had finally moved to the University of Ibadan, Institute of Librarianship, to pursue the Postgraduate Diploma in Librarianship from October 1967 to June 1968, while resident at the Postgraduate Wing of Queen Elizabeth Hall there. During the period in Oyo, she had taught Latin from form I to VI, English in form I and Religious Studies in form III, was in charge of the School Library, was a House Mistress, and to top it all, was Assistant Games Mistress for the last few years.

        That all round involvement continued throughout her career. Towards this end, she had been active holding official positions, both in her professional associations of Librarianship and Classics and in other spheres of the Administration of the University of Jos and related activities in the Community.

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES

        From July 1968 when she had her first appointment in the Library profession as an Assistant Librarian i/c. of Maps in the University of Ibadan Library, she became active in the Nigerian Library Association. Her first position was Secretary of the Western State Chapter of Nigerian Library Association, School Libraries Section of which she later became Chairman.

        She next changed her status from single to married in November 1970 and accompanied her husband, Dr. J. Olowo Ojoade to Cape Coast in Ghana where he was lecturing at the University’s Department of Classics. There she was a teacher/librarian at St. Augustine’s College, teaching the boys Latin from form I to V; English from form I to III and fostering their interest in reading as she ran the School Library. As a staff member of the college, she was Secretary of the staff meetings from 1971-1972, while on the professional side, she was Secretary of the Classical Association of Ghana during the same period.

        Back to Nigeria in July 1972, Mrs. A.B. Ojoade was appointed sub-librarian in charge of the library at Jos Campus of University of Ibadan, again accompanying her husband who had secured the headship of the Department of Classics there.

        At the local level she was Chairman of the Benue/Plateau State Division of the Nigerian Library Association and after the creation of more states in 1976, she continued as Chairman of Plateau State Division of the Nigerian Library Association till 1979, after which she was an Exco member till 1986.

        At the highest level of the Nigerian Library Association she served as a Councillor not only by right of her position as Chairman of a State Division, but also as an elected Councillor in her own right in 1982.

        Over the years, Mrs. Ojoade practicalised her professionalism as a member of the Plateau State Library Board while it existed in 1977; as a member of the National Task Force on Library Statistics and later Chairman of the Task Force and as Coordinator of the National Library Zonal Workshop on Library Statistics in 1981. She was also Coordinator of the Academic Libraries Section of the Nigerian Library Association Seminar in October 1988.

        She interacted with other organisations in Plateau State to bring libraries to the community through discussions on Radio Plateau and Plateau Television and as invited speaker at various school functions.

        As a senior member of the library profession in the country, she had been on the interview panel to select a College of Education Librarian and had been external assessor for four Deputy University Librarians and one Polytechnic Librarian. As an academic, she has to her credit publications in reputable journals and papers presented at several conferences.

        In her position as Librarian in charge of the University of Jos Library since 1991, Mrs. Ojoade had been a member of the Committee of University Librarians of Nigerian Universities (CULNU) whose meetings she regularly attended.

        She had inherited the Chairmanship of the Editorial Board of the Nigerian Periodicals Index from 1991, coordinating in 1996 the production of volume 3, the first computer-collated volume.

        Since 1992 when Mrs. Ojoade introduced the first computer to the University of Jos Library, she has steered the computerization of its processes in conjunction with the University Computer Centre. This led to the computer networking of the Library in 1998 as part of the University’s Intranet in which the Library’s Webpage features.

        As an active participant in the National Universities Commission/World Bank Project Implementation Committee of University Libraries, Mrs. Ojoade was appointed a member of the National Universities Commission Team on Formative Evaluation of the World Bank Federal Universities Project in 1994.

        From 1995 to 1997 Mrs. Ojoade served as Plateau State representative on the Book Aid International Northern States Distribution Committee. In July 1998, Mrs. Ojoade’s services as University Librarian were recognised by sponsorship through DANIDA to represent Nigerian University Libraries at the Standing Conference of the Association of National and University Librarians of East, Central and Southern Africa (SCANUL-ECS) at Eldoret, Kenya. In 1999 Mrs. Ojoade was again recognized when she was asked to be Coordinator in Nigeria for the revived Standing Conference of African University Librarians in West Africa (SCAULWA) meeting in Accra, Ghana in November 1999, where she was elected one of three representatives from Nigerian University Libraries on the New Executive Committee of SCAULWA.

OTHER CONTRIBUTIONS IN THE COMMUNITY

        Mrs. Ojoade’s variety of interests has been demonstrated by her active involvement in several associations wherever she resided; in 1965 she was Secretary of Oyo/Osun Amateur Athletic Association at Oyo, 1967 to 1970 Secretary, Nigerian Careers Council at Ibadan, 1974 to 1980 Chairman, Nigerian National Museum Society, Jos, during which period she was sponsored by the National Museum to represent the Society in 1978 at the Congress of Friends of Museums in Florence, Italy. As a concerned parent, she had been in the Executive Committees of the Parent-Teachers Association (P.T.A.) of the two schools that her daughter and two sons attended – as Secretary/Treasurer of PTA Hillcrest School, Jos in 1980 and Treasurer of PTA Baptist High school, Jos from 1990 to 1993.

        Since 1991 Mrs. Ojoade has held official positions in two Church Societies in her Parish of St. Louis in the Catholic Archdiocese of Jos – Secretary of the International Society of St. Vincent de Paul, working for the needy in the community 1991 to 1999 and since then as President, Secretary of the same society’s Jos Central Council since November 1999, Finance Officer of the Integrated Development Commission Justice and Peace Movement of St. Louis Parish and more recently as Acting Secretary of the Human Rights Organization, an offshoot of Justice and Peace Movement of the Catholic Archdiocese of Jos.

        The above presentation, then, constitutes just the tip of the iceberg of the personality of someone who has not only been active in her profession, but also has managed by God’s grace and strength, to be active generally among those with whom she has been interacting throughout her adult life.

        Now, may I present to you, with a catalogue of attributes acclaiming a personality of personalities, a classicist by training, an experienced educationist, a committed worker, dedicated and dutiful officer, forthright in speech, a notorious note-writer, constant communicator, an articulate advocate for libraries, an informed and informing information specialist, physical gateway to knowledge, ever ready to serve, outstanding organiser, profound performer, action lady, iron librarian – hailing from Trinidad and Tobago, popularly called The Land of the Humming Bird, The Land of Calypso, now Nigerian by marriage, a devoted wife and caring mother of three university graduates – an accountant, an industrial designer and an electrical engineer who is present here with us tonight as he is currently a member of NYSC in Port Harcourt – in sum, I present to you, the renowned University Librarian, retiring from the University of Jos, none other than, Mrs. Audrey Bernice Ojoade.