Nigeria, Sept. 2 -- On Sunday, 31 August, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, Nigeria's former minister of Agriculture and Rural Development (2011 - 2015), completed his maximum ten-year tenure (five years each per election) as president of the African Development Bank (AfDB), the premier development finance bank in Africa which effectively began operations in 1964, and more robustly on 1 July, 1966, to promote integration, unity, growth and development, individually and collectively, in its member countries. The bank has a total of 81 members - 54 African independent countries as regional members, and 27 non-regional, non-African countries. Nigeria is the largest shareholder of the bank, with 9 per cent of the entire shareholding.

When Dr Adesina was...