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Akintola Williams: The 100 Year-Old Accounting Colossus
By Eric Elezuo
Hurray!! The accounting wizard is 100 years!
Only few persons are known to have come from rich and influential families, and still managed to carve a niche for themselves, made their own names and stood apart from the crowd. One of such persons is the indefatigable and ever committed accounting guru, arguably the best the country ever produced, Chief Akintola Williams, who clocked an enviable 100 years on August 9.
Chief Williams was born on August 9, 1919 to the Ekundayo Williams family. His father was a lawyer and farmer while his grandfather, Z. A. Williams, was a prolific businessman from Abeokuta. His background really set the stage for the young Akintola to take the world by storm, rise above mediocrity and start an all new hegemony devoid of entrepreneurship, law and farming that his forebears were known for. He created a new vista, a new environment and subdued the field of accountancy. He became the first African to qualify as a chartered accountant.
Akintola took off on the journey of life when he began his education at Olowogbowo Methodist Primary School, Bankole street, Apongbon, Lagos Island, Lagos, in the early 1930s. This was the same primary school his late younger half-brother, Chief Rotimi Williams, attended.
After his primary education, he proceeded to the CMS Grammar School, also in Lagos and made one of the best results, which took him to the only higher institution of learning at the time, Yaba Higher College, now Yaba College of Technology. His education at the institution was sponsored by a UAC scholarship as a result of his brilliance. He obtained a Diploma in Commerce on graduation.
In 1944, he was admitted to the University of London, England, to study Banking and Finance, and in 1946, he graduated with a Bachelor of Commerce. He did not stop there, but continued steadfastly in his studies, qualifying as a chartered accountant in England in 1949.
After qualifying as a chartered accountant, Williams professionally started his career when he took up paid employment with the Colonial office in London. He was thereafter posted to Nigeria, and he returned home in 1950 to take the post of Inspector of Taxes, working with John Selby, whose advice laid his path to considering accountancy as a course.
In 1952 therefore, he left the job and its huge benefits to set up his own firm, Akintola Williams and Co in Lagos. It became the first indigenous chartered accounting firm in Africa. It would be recalled that 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.
With master touches of professionalism, his firm later grew ‘organically and through mergers’ to become the largest professional services firm in Nigeria by 2004. Williams participated in founding the Nigerian Stock Exchange and the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria. During a long career, he has received many honours.
With his deft moves and diplomatic connections, he 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 the new state-owned corporations including the Electricity Corporation of Nigeria, the Western Nigeria Development Corporation, the Eastern Nigeria Development Corporation, the Nigerian Railway Corporation and the Nigerian Ports Authority.
By 1964, the expansion of his firm has started as a branch was opened in the Cameroons. This was followed by branches in Côte d’Ivoire and Swaziland, and affiliates in Ghana, Egypt and Kenya. By March 1992, the company had 19 partners and 535 staff. This obviously attested to the hard work the seasoned accountant has put into his work.
With the advent of the Companies Act of 1968, demand for his services increased. This act required that companies operating in Nigeria formed locally incorporated subsidiaries and published audited annual accounts. The drive in the early 1970s to encourage indigenous ownership of businesses also increased demand, and Williams was responsive to all challenges.
In 1973, AW Consultant Ltd, a management consultancy headed by Chief Arthur Mbanefo, was spun off. The company acquired a computer service company and a secretarial service, and in 1977, the company entered into an agreement with Touche Ross International based on profit sharing. Williams was also a board member and major shareholder in a number of other companies. He retired in 1983.
Between April 1999 and May 2004, Akintola Williams & Co. merged with two other accounting firms to create Akintola Williams Deloitte, the largest professional services firm in Nigeria with a staff of over 600.
Among many of his achievements, Williams played a leading role in establishing the Association of Accountants in Nigeria in 1960 with the goal of training accountants. He was also the first President of the association as well as the founding member and first president of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria. He is very good at creating new things. He was also involved in establishing the Nigerian Stock Exchange. Akintola Williams remained actively involved with these organisations into his old age.
With an eye on due process, he called on operators to protect the stock exchange market and ensure there was no scandal. He said that, if needed, market operators should not hesitate to seek his advice on resolving any problem. He made himself available even as a retiree.
Some of the public sector positions he held are enormous and they include 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).
Other positions include 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.
In 1982, Williams’ efforts were recognized and he was honoured by the Nigerian Government with the O.F. R. award
Following retirement in 1983, Williams sought to diversify and keep himself busy. That prompted an all new project aimed at establishing a music centre and concert hall for the Music Society of Nigeria.
In April 1997, he was appointed a Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire for services to the accountancy profession and for promotion of arts, culture and music through the Musical Society of Nigeria. The Akintola Williams Arboretum at the Nigerian Conservation Foundation headquarters in Lagos is named in his honour.
As the expansion keeps becoming a recurring decimal, the firm adopted the business name “Akintola Williams Deloitte” on July 30, 2004. It has remained the oldest indigenous firm in Nigeria.
On the 8th of 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.
A Centenarian of no mean repute, Akintola Williams clocked 100 healthy and productive years on August 9, 2019, drawing accolades from reputable movers and shakers of Nigerian and international business as well as politics.
Sir, for your achievements which are innumerable and the many lives you have touched in your 100 years on earth, and since 1952 when you took the bull by the horn to float your own firm, you are our Boss of the Week.
Congrats and happy birthday sir!
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has expelled Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Nyesom Wike, its suspended National Secretary, Samuel Anyanwu, and former Governor of Ekiti State, Ayo Fayose.
Their expulsion was announced on Saturday at the party’s National Convention in Ibadan, Oyo State.
The Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) has insisted that there is Christian genocide ongoing in Nigeria, hence demanding end to the alleged Christian killings.
Speaking on Thursday after an emergency executive meeting of the Fellowship held at its national headquarters in Lagos, PFN President, Bishop Francis Wale Oke, said the body would no longer remain silent while Christians are “targeted, killed, raped, and displaced” across the country.
He said: “There is Christian genocide going on in Nigeria. If we call it by any other name, it will bring Nigeria down. We are crying out to our international friends, beginning with America and Donald Trump. Whatever you can do to help our government put an end to it, come quickly and get it done. When on Christmas Day, Christmas Day was turned a bloody day in Benue State, and hundreds were massacred. And we are to be conducting mass funerals when we are not in open conflict. What do you call that? And this is different from individual cases.
“Let us call a spade a spade. There is Christian genocide ongoing in Nigeria,”Bishop Oke declared.
“Even while we speak, killings are still taking place in Borno, Plateau, and Benue states. When 501 Christians were massacred in Dogon Noma in Plateau, what do we call that? When Christmas Day turned into a bloody day in Benue, with hundreds massacred, what name should we give it?
While noting that the United States President Donald Trump spoke the truth, the PRN President cited the case of Leah Sharibu who was abducted alongside other Chibok girls and has since remained in captivity.
“Like the case of Leah Sharibu. Where is Leah Sharibu? Like the case of Deborah that was lynched and burned alive in Sokoto? What about that? And several of our girls were kidnapped and forced, given out as wives by force without the consent of their parents and their Christian parents. And the Christian parents would not see them for years.And this has been going on. We have been talking and we are not taking it seriously. And it has been going on again and again, until Donald Trump now spoke. And Donald Trump spoke the truth. There is Christian genocide going on in Nigeria.
“Like you will have picked in the news, even since this narrative began, killing was still going on in Borno, in Plateau, in Benue, up until yesterday. What are we saying? When 501 Christians were massacred in Dogonaya in Plateau State, what do we call that? And for no offense other than they are Christians.”
Oke recalled that the Christian community had repeatedly called the attention of the government to the alleged genocide with no decisive action from the authority.
The cleric expressed his backing for President Trump’s intervention, adding that Trump only echoed what Nigerian Christians had been saying for year
“I was part of the team that went to see the immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari. We spoke very strongly about this and the President listened to us, but he completely ignored the main issue we came for, If we came and spoke with such vehemence, with such passion, and then you pick the peripheral matter and left this matter alone, I knew that day that his government was complicit in what was going on,” he added.
Oke alleged that the killings across parts of Nigeria were systematic and targeted on Christians, lamenting that the killings had continued unchecked despite repeated appeals from the Church.
“The evidence is all over the place. There is nothing anybody can say that can whitewash it. It is evil, it is blood shedding, it is mass murder and it is genocide. The time to stop it is now. That is what the church in Nigeria is saying with one voice.
“Christians in this nation must be free to practice their faith in any part of Nigeria as bona fide citizens of Nigeria.
“These armed bandits, Fulani herdsmen, Boko Haram, ISWAP, all of them using Islam as a cover. We have been living in peace with our Muslim brothers for a long, until this violent Islamic sect came up with an intent to make sure they impose Sharia on all Nigerians,” Oke said.
Bishop Oke called on President Bola Tinubu to decisively overhaul the nation’s security architecture, and ensure justice for victims of religious violence. He questioned why those responsible for notorious attacks—such as the killing of Deborah Samuel in Sokoto and the abduction of Leah Sharibu and the Chibok schoolgirls—remain unpunished.
“The government should prove by action, not words, that it is not complicit,” he said. “When hundreds are buried in mass graves and the whole world sees it, who can deny it? Why should we play politics with the blood of Nigerians?”
The PFN urged President Tinubu’s administration to rebuild trust by ensuring that the security architecture of the country is not infiltrated by those sympathetic to extremist ideologies.
Oke further condemned the government’s rehabilitation of so-called “repentant terrorists,” describing the move as a grave security.
He assured Christians that the PFN would continue to speak out until the killings stop. “We are not going to keep quiet. We will keep raising our voices until justice is done and every Nigerian, regardless of faith, can live in peace. The truth may be suppressed for a time, but it cannot be buried forever,” he said.
The meeting, which drew PFN leaders from across the country, reaffirmed the body’s commitment to national unity, peace, and the protection of fundamental human rights, while urging the media to “side with the oppressed” and report the truth without fear or bias.
US President Donald Trump has signed a federal spending bill, officially ending the longest government shutdown in American history.
The legislation, passed by the House of Representatives in a 222–209 vote, followed narrow approval in the Senate just two days earlier. The bill restores funding to federal agencies after 43 days of closure, bringing relief to millions of government employees and citizens affected by halted services.
Speaking after signing the measure on Wednesday night, Trump described the deal as a political victory, asserting that Democrats unnecessarily prolonged the shutdown.
“They didn’t want to do it the easy way. They had to do it the hard way, and they look very bad,” he said.
The temporary funding bill maintains government operations only through 30 January, creating a new deadline for lawmakers to negotiate a long-term budget solution.
As part of the agreement, Senate leaders committed to an early December vote on Obamacare subsidies, a key priority for Democrats during the shutdown standoff.
In addition to reopening federal offices, the bill provides full-year funding for the Department of Agriculture, military construction projects, and several legislative branch offices.
It also ensures retroactive pay for federal workers affected by the shutdown and allocates funding to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, which helps about one in eight Americans access food.
The shutdown, which began in October, forced the suspension of many government services, leaving an estimated 1.4 million federal employees either furloughed or working without pay. It also disrupted food assistance programmes and caused widespread delays in domestic air travel.
With federal operations now resumed, attention in Washington has turned to whether Congress and the White House can reach a longer-term funding agreement before the new deadline at the end of January.
