By Steve Osuji
One of the last titans of the banking profession in Nigeria, Alhaji Salihu Abubakar Ehimeakhe turns 80 on this day, December 20th, 2025.
Those who know him still wonder how he seems to defy aging. At four scores, he manages to maintain his gait and imposing physique.
For one who’s six feet five inches tall, he remains ramrod and straight. Eighty looks good on him, many enthuse.
Aging has not affected his mind either. Extremely quick-witted and fastidious, Alhaji Ehimeakhe is among the few British-trained, authentic bankers still around.
When you engage him on the subject of banking, he would often shake his head about ethical deficits and unprofessional conducts that seem to pervade the industry today.
He is worried that bankers of this generation seem to have forgotten their raison d’etre; the reason many are in banking today seems to be vastly different from that for which people of his era were. He thinks the fiduciary duty between the banker and his customer has almost vanished. This, of course, continues to erode the integrity of bankers generally.
The respected weekly journal, The Economist of London once described today’s bankers as ‘banksters.’ That description is not far from reality. Bankers of earlier times epitomised integrity, conservatism, and acute professionalism. They shunned flamboyance and ostentatious living.
They were stoic, operating quietly from the background. The wellbeing of customers and proper management of their hard-earned resources were uppermost in the minds of true bankers of yore.
Today, flamboyance and rapacity seem to be the hallmarks of banking. To the point that we see cases of bankers becoming richer than the very institution they are trusted with.
It also explains why banking institutions that are over 100 years old suddenly fail. That should never happen. If bankers work strictly according to best practices established banking behemoths should never fail.
One eternal lesson he harps upon is the need for a succession plan. This is not only key in organisations but even in life and down to families. The consequences are often dire when careful and proper succession plans are neglected. Nothing kills a company/business faster than handing over to the wrong successor.
Alhaji, as we call him, had a most stellar career in Union Bank of Nigeria, UBN and rose to the position of the sole General Manager of UBN when the bank was among the top three in Nigeria.
He would later contend for the number one position of GMD/CEO for which he was suitably prepared academically and professionally by Barclays Bank that saw that great potential in him.
It was from this burgeoning portfolio that he led the supervision of all the bank’s subsidiaries whose MDs reported to him. He was also chairman of over eight committees of the bank.
Ehimeakhe was also the de facto leader of Union Bank’s historic re-engineering process. The then MD/CEO knowing his abilities to steer the project, entrusted it to him. After the highly successful commencement of the turnaround that witnessed the introduction of the hardware and software of the bank’s computerisation, Ehimeakhe was primed and widely speculated to succeed the incumbent MD/CEO but for the Nigerian factor!
When it was the vogue in Nigeria’s banking system to separate wholesale from retail banking, it was Ehimeakhe the lot fell upon to carry out the arduous duty of resuscitating the comatose Union Merchant Bank (UMB) after two earlier attempts had failed.
In spite of initial challenges, UMB under Ehimeakhe as it’s new MD/CEO was an unqualified success. He and his team ran the bank profitably winning the Issuing House of the Year award for two consecutive years and beating the likes of IBTC to the race.
As a teller in 1966, young Ehimeakhe’s outstanding brilliance, diligence, dedication to duty and standout performance earned him record-setting promotions at the time. Further, his outstanding performance in all the banking courses did not escape the notice of the British managers in Barclays Bank of Nigeria (as Union Bank was then known).
Ehimeakhe was therefore, singled out on merit, out of thousands of staff of the bank, for in-service course in either Economics or Business Administration in any Nigerian university of his choice with all expenses paid – tuition, board, books, etc. He was also to enjoy the unabated payment of his monthly salaries and allowances.
Ehimeakhe opted for Business Administration at Ahmadu Bello University.
He enjoys the distinction of being the first and only beneficiary of such unique sponsorship!
He graduated with flying colours and returned to his duty post in the bank.
At only 33 years of age, while heading the Bank Road branch in Kano (UBN’s 3rd biggest branch then), Ehimeakhe was head-hunted to head Union Bank UK Ltd as the pioneer General Manager.
He had to politely decline on account of his aged parents that needed close care as well as extended family responsibilities.
He similarly declined to take up an overseas scholarship in his early banking days in order to continue to cater for his immediate siblings in secondary school.
This trait of strong family orientation and a sense of filial well-being for all has remained till today.
He rose rapidly, reaching the very top of his professional career in UBN before politics and narrow biases (other than merit) began to influence promotions in a rather perverse way. This phenomenon signalled the downturn that eventually made the big, strong, reliable stallion go belly up.
Alhaji Ehimeakhe was truly a thoroughbred professional who rose from the shop floor to the zenith of his career by merit and merit alone.
During the heady days of President Ibrahim Babangida, all he had to do was to avail his CV to a couple of bosom friends close to the seat of power who had approached him, and he would have been appointed MD/CEO of any of the top three banks (First Bank, UBN and UBA).
But Alhaji Ehimeakhe gently declined those approaches as they run counter to his strong professional orientation and strong belief that an appointment that he ordinarily should earn by merit was influenced by political considerations.
He was of course, well respected by his colleagues in the industry (and even feared by some) for his insistence on merit and principled leadership.
Yours truly was the corporate affairs manager of UMB as well as personal assistant to Alhaji Ehimeakhe for about three years. He is not only a devout Muslim, he is a veritable model of the faith who lived its tenets with minimum obtrusion. He never missed his prayers yet no file lingered on his desk. Many of his close friends are non-Muslims. Indeed, he mingled freely with all, apparently blind to faith and ethnic origins. He rather set store by content of one’s character and integrity quotient.
Alhaji had what some of his contemporaries have dubbed as a punishing work ethic which comprised working long hours and attention to even the minutest details.
He has a heart of gold and charity comes naturally to him though he would rather do them quietly. He has just handed over a modern mosque to the Muslims in his hometown Warakke, in Edo North.
He is married to one wife with whom they have seven children, all grown up, well educated in Nigeria and overseas and very well established as Engineers (Chemical /Petroleum with BSc and MSc degrees respectively, Computer Software and Hardware), Pharmacist, (Doctor of Pharmacy), Orthodontist (BDS UI, MSc Cosmetics Dentistry Manchester, DDS Minnesota, Orthodontics Atlanta), Lawyer (LLB Manchester, BL Law School Nigeria, LLM Nottingham) and Economist and Investment Banker with Merrill Lynch).
He attributes the glaring success of his children to God who has shown him and his household exceeding love and mercy. He also emphasises the importance of quality parenting with measured application of stick and carrot. Plus unflinching and dedicated family support for the children until they gain some stability in life.
As you read this, Alhaji is being treated like a king in some exotic Island resort off the coast of Mexico by his children. A fitting celebration for a great dad on his landmark birthday.
Though he doesn’t wear his chieftaincy titles, he is the Aloaye of Auchi Kingdom and the Fowoshaiye of Remo Land.
He is a mentor and a source of inspiration for many who seek to model after a highly disciplined and cultured life that Alhaji easily represents.
This is wishing Alhaji Ehimeakhe more years in good health.
