Former Daily Times editorial board chairman Ayo Olukotun is dead

Prof Ayo Olukotun

Political scientist, media scholar and newspaper columnist Professor Ayo Olukoyun is dead.

The former Daily Times editorial board chairman died on Wednesday after a few weeks of illness.

His death was announced in a Facebook post by Dr Bukola Oyenyi.

The post read: “This is not the way to start a new year, but we accept fate.

“Professor Ayo Olukotun, the renowned political scientist, media scholar, and the Oba Sikiru Kayode Adetona Professorial Chair in Governance, Political Science Department, Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye, Ogun State, died a few minutes ago.

“Professor Olukotun is a “mentor”, an “enviable academic” and a “fine columnist”, whose works have contributed to the shaping of public policy and discourse in the past three decades.

“He has lectured at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, University of Lagos and Lagos State University and was a visiting professor of International Relations at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife. He was also a distinguished professor and head of, Department of Political Science and Dean, Faculty of Social Sciences at the Lead City University.

“As a journalist, he was the Chair of the Editorial Board of Daily Times; and through his weekly penetrative columns that have appeared in Daily Times, Guardian, Compass and Punch and several other frontline newspapers, Professor Olukotun evoked deep ideas to challenge issues of bad governance in the country, while copiously recommending alternative pathways to national redemption.

“May his soul rest in peace.”