Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, the Director General/Chief Executive Officer (DG/CEO) of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), is no doubt one of the ‘young turks’ spearheading the country’s aggressive drive to develop a world class IT industry. From his vantage position as DG of NITDA, the soft-spoken Abdullahi has been leading an explosive growth in the development of IT infrastructure and the Nigerian digital economy. As Nigeria’s Chief Information Technology Officer (CITO), his unique and enviable personality has positioned him to be a role model for Nigerian youths who consider him “a worthy youth ambassador in governance".

Mallam Abdullahi is a thoroughbred IT professional with an impressive resume in public and private sector IT development, policy formulation, and IT governance. He graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University Bauchi. He holds various executive certificates from top-notch universities such as Harvard University, USA, University of Cambridge and Oxford University, UK. Mallam Abdullahi is also an alumni of the prestigious IMD Business School, Switzerland and a trained strategist from the world-famous Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He equally holds many professional certifications in telecommunications, service management, networking and solution design.

Mallam Abdullahi, being the first Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE) in Nigeria’s public sector, also has over 15 years of professional IT and management experience. He started his professional career at Galaxy Backbone Ltd where he served as a Network Engineer and Senior Network and Lead Solution Architect. In 2014, he joined the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) as a Technology Architect where he was part of the team that developed the bank’s Technology Architecture Repository (TAR) and also executed software license rationalization that has increased cost savings for the bank in licensing annual subscription. He joined NITDA in 2017 as the Technical Assistant to Dr Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, FNCS, FBCS, FIIM, the then Director General/CEO and now Honourble Minister of Communications and Digital Economy and has significantly contributed to the Agency’s growth and development.

On 20th August, 2019, Mallam Abdullahi was appointed the Director-General of NITDA by the President Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR. Thus far, Mallam Abdullahi has steered the Agency along the path of working creatively and assiduously for the growth of the IT sector. Under the direction of Mallam Abdullahi, NITDA has achieved several milestones in barely two years. He has expressed his determination to expand Nigeria’s digital economy, rolling out various programs towards digital transformation, digital innovation and entrepreneurship, developmental regulation, exploring emerging technology and promotion of indigenous IT content amongst others.

Early 2020, when the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic presented a major challenge to all countries around the world, the distinguished strategist rose to the challenge by developing various digital educational content and accessed remotely by thousands of Nigerians as well as crafted remote working strategies to assist the government in continuing its public service to Nigerians. Mallam Abdullahi or simply ‘Kashifu’ as he is fondly called by friends, colleagues and associates, continues to provide able leadership to NITDA in discharging its onerous duty of catalyzing the growth of the Nigerian IT sector and digital economy.