Akintola Williams, Nigeria’s first indigenous chartered accountant, is dead, aged 104.
According to reports, the Doyen of Accountancy in the country and Africa, passed on around 9am this morning.
The deceased, who was the first Nigerian to qualify as a chartered accountant, recently celebrated his 104th birthday on 9 August, 2023.
He was a founding member and the first President of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN) and the first African accountant.
His wife, Mabel Efunroye (née Coker), passed on in 2009 at age 88.
Akintola Williams began his education at Olowogbowo Methodist Primary School, Bankole Street, Apongbon, Lagos Island, Lagos, in the early 1930s. His late younger brother, Chief Rotimi Williams SAN, attended same school.
His firm, founded in 1952, grew organically and through mergers to become the largest professional services firm in Nigeria by 2004.
Williams participated in founding the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE). He received many honours during a long career.
After returning to Nigeria in 1950, Williams served as a civil servant with the Inland Revenue as an assessment officer.
He left in the March 1952 and founded Akintola Williams & Co. in Lagos. The company was the first indigenous chartered accounting firm in Africa.
At the time, the accountancy business was dominated by five large foreign firms. Although there were a few small local firms, they were certified rather than chartered accountants.
Williams gained business from indigenous companies, including Nnamdi Azikiwe’s West African Pilot, K. O. Mbadiwe’s African Insurance Company, Fawehinmi Furniture and Ojukwu Transport.
He also provided services to several state-owned corporations which were then new.
They included the Electricity Corporation of Nigeria, Western Nigeria Development Corporation, Eastern Nigeria Development Corporation, the Nigerian Railway Corporation and the Nigerian Ports Authority.
Williams was also a board member and major shareholder in a number of other companies.
Between April 1999 and May 2004, Akintola Williams & Co. merged with two other accounting firms to create Akintola Williams Deloitte (now known as Deloitte & Touche), the largest professional services firm in Nigeria with a staff of over 600
Williams was actively involved in the activities of ICAN and NSE very well into his old age.
He held several positions in the public sector, including Chairman of the Federal Income Tax Appeal Commissioners (1958–68); member of the Coker Commission of Inquiry into the Statutory Corporations of the former Western Region of Nigeria (1962);
Member of the Board of Trustees of the Commonwealth Foundation (1966–1975); Chairman of the Lagos State Government Revenue Collection Panel (1973) and Chairman of the Public Service Review Panel to correct the anomalies in the Udoji Salary Review Commission (1975).
He held other positions: President of the Metropolitan Club in Victoria Island, Lagos; Founder and Council member of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation and Founder and chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Musical Society of Nigeria (MSN).
In 1982, Akintola Williams was honoured by the Nigerian Government with the OF R.
Following his retirement in 1983, Williams threw himself into a project to establish a music centre and concert hall for the MSN.
In April 1997, he was appointed a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for his services to the accountancy profession and for promotion of arts, culture and music through the MSN.
The Akintola Williams Arboretum at the Nigerian Conservation Foundation Headquarters in Lagos is named in his honour.
On 8 May 2011, the Nigeria-Britain Association presented awards to John Kufuor, past President of Ghana, and to Akintola Williams, for their contributions to democracy and development in Africa.
•Additional information from Wikipedia.
