The President, Muhammadu Buhari sent a cheery, and indelibly-rare felicitation to Adeduntan for putting Nigeria on the international map. The President participated in the mood of joy enabled by the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, First Bank, Dr. Adesola Adedutan on his award of Distinguished Alumnus of the Year by Cranfield School of Management, United Kingdom. A gesture amplifying morale, an encouragement to the positive attitude needed to reverse the Nigerian identity now tainted abroad.

To the president, the award is a symbol of confidence, an emblem of goodwill for the Nigerian professionals who strive day and night to put the country in a healthy shape. The Nigerian professionals, indeed there are too many of them but nevertheless equally and arguably amongst the best in the world, the president opined. Where this recognition leads, what it says is that hardwork will always be celebrated.

Adeduntan earned the shining award for aligning with the value of the school. The financial guru is a principled individual, he paved his way over the years on the mattings of green-white-green, made his ordinary background of large tree trunks into boats that sailed him under the moonlight, under the sun to the future he envisioned. Cranfield School of Management has accorded Adeduntan’s exemplary life as not just worthy of praise but also as a focal point, ” a role model to students and potential students.” The President holds this showering of praise by Cranfield School to Adeduntan, at large, as endorsement to the people of Nigeria, a thing of pride.

A little about Adeduntan reveals that he attended Cranfield School of Management in 2004 as British Chevening Scholar. Thereafter, he became a member of Chartered Institute of Banking in Nigeria and Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria. The financial titan currently holds a place on the board of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group, and as a non-executive director on the boards of the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS), Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), FBN Bank U.K. Ltd., Universal Payments Plc., and FMDQ OTC Securities Exchange. On completing his undergraduate degree in 1992, he launched his career at Afribank as a graduate trainee and later, decades of years spent learning the financial ropes, he climbed to the top as Managing Durector of First Bank in 2016.