By Prof. Charles Soludo, the candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), on Wednesday, was declared winner of the just-concluded governorship election in Anambra State.
Soludo, a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), polled 112,229 votes to defeat his two major contenders: Valentine Ozigbo of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who got 53,807 votes, and Andy Uba of the All Progressives Congress (APC) who secured 43,285 votes.
In this piece, BlackBox Nigeria highlights thirteen things you should know about the Anambra State governor-elect.
1. He was born on July 28, 1960, into the family of Pa Simeon Soludo.
2. He attended the Uga Boys High School where he was the senior prefect.
3. In 1984, Soludo bagged a first class honours degree in economics at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), Enugu State.
4. He later earned a master’s degree in 1987 and a doctorate in 1989 from the same institution and department. He became a professor of economics at UNN in 1998.
5. In 1999, he became a visiting professor at Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States. He has also taught at top global institutions including Oxford University, Cambridge University and Warwick University.
6. Soludo holds the title of the third-highest national honour — Commander of the Order of the Federal Republic (CFR).
7. In 2003, former President Olusegun Obasanjo appointed him as a chief economic adviser.
8. He became the CBN governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria in 2004.
9. In September 2019, President Muhammadu Buhari appointed Soludo as a member of a newly formed 8-member Economic Advisory Council (EAC).
10. He was the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2010 governorship election in the Anambra State.
11. He left the PDP and joined APGA in the buildup to the 2013 governorship poll in the state. He was, however, disqualified by the party’s screening committee.
12. Soludo officially declared to run for governor under APGA in February 2021.
13. After an initial refusal to recognise him as the APGA flag bearer for the November 6 election, the Supreme Court later declared Soludo as the eligible candidate.
