Governor of Kaduna State, in northern Nigeria, where he is facing some of Africa’s most extraordinary challenges at close quarters. A former leading member of Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo’s economic team, he was in charge of Nigeria’s wave of privatizations in the early noughts, and the dramatic retreat of the Nigerian government from a command and control economy. He holds degrees in economics, public policy, quantity survey, and law and, in addition to his job as governor, is a PhD candidate in philosophy and public policy at Maastricht University. He also is the author of the memoir, Accidental Public Servant.