Victoria Okojie

Victoria Oare Okojie was a Nigerian librarian, academic and administrator who helped give African library professionals a stronger continental voice. Born in Nigeria on 28 November 1959, she spent more than four decades in library and information work, moving from university stacks to national regulation and international leadership.

Her professional path began in 1984 as Librarian II at the Kenneth Dike Library of the University of Ibadan. After postgraduate study she completed a master's degree in library science at the University of Ibadan and later a PhD in library and information science at Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria in 2012. Between campus posts she joined the British Council in 1994 and rose to director, reported as the first Nigerian to hold that rank there. She also consulted for the World Bank, UNESCO and the UK Department for International Development, work that linked Nigerian library practice to wider development agendas.

From 2000 to 2010 she served as president of the Nigerian Library Association. In 2009 she became the first Registrar and Chief Executive Officer of the Librarians' Registration Council of Nigeria, the federal body that regulates the profession. She later taught library and information science at the University of Abuja while remaining active in continental organising.

Internationally she chaired the IFLA Africa Section from 2011 to 2015 and served on the IFLA Governing Board. In 2013, while still chair of the Africa Section, she was a founding figure of the African Library and Information Associations and Institutions (AfLIA), arguing that African libraries needed a united platform in continental development. She also sat on UNESCO's Memory of the World International Advisory Committee and advised the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Global Libraries Program. In 2022 she co-edited Global Perspectives on Sustainable Library Practices, extending her scholarship into sustainability and library futures.

Colleagues remembered her as a mentor who pushed younger African librarians into leadership. AfLIA later called her a passionate advocate and a dedicated champion of the African library profession. She received the Nigerian Library Association's eminent service award in 2000, fellowship of the association in 2005, and other national honours including recognition as an Icon of Education in 2012. An honorary doctorate from Commonwealth University, Belize, followed the same year.

Okojie died on 14 September 2026 at the age of 66, after what AfLIA described as a sudden passing. The IFLA Africa Section confirmed the news the same day. Her death closed a career that had run from a university library appointment in Ibadan to the regulation of Nigerian librarianship and the founding infrastructure of African library association life. She left colleagues across Nigeria and AfLIA mourning a teacher, administrator and organiser whose work had widened the profession's reach.