By Fehintolu Faniyi
Dr. Siju Iluyomade has never needed applause to affirm her purpose. No! For this architect of renewal, her life’s work is its own loud ovation. A life poured out for others.
Without question, she stands today as one of the most compelling champions of social justice, skill acquisition, and economic empowerment of women. And this is not by some lofty declarations. Never! It is simply by a quiet, relentless labour of service that has changed the destinies of thousands. And still counting.
“Dr Siju is tenacious”, a close observer of her Arise projects once screamed.
For 17 unbroken years, she has turned compassion into infrastructure and vision into impact. Through the Arise Foundation, she has rewritten the story of countless women who once lived on the fragile edges of possibility. She has taken the everyday struggles of the vulnerable and transformed them into testimonies of dignity, strength, and rebirth. So, when you hear Arise Foundation today, it is about one woman, one heart that builds villages, a soul where compassion connects with unyielding courage, a portrait of service and strength. This is who Dr Siju Asake Iluyomade is. This is her life. And nothing really could diminish the staggering strides of this ultra-committed change agent.
Her Arise Walk for Life has become more than an annual movement. It is a unifying ritual that dissolves boundaries. Men and women, young and old, from every tribe and faith, walk side by side in a shared celebration of health, hope, and humanity. In a country often divided by palpable tribe and religious fault lines, Dr Siju has built a road where everyone walks together.
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Yet her compassion does not stop at city gates. Through the Arise Adopt-a-Village Scheme, she has journeyed to forgotten communities and hamlets across Nigeria’s north and south, where time seemed to have stood still. There, she has brought renewal :
– Free schools where learning is no longer a luxury;
– Hospitals where childbirth is safe and free;
– Continuous primary healthcare that reaches the sick before sickness reaches them;
– Boreholes that turn scarcity of portable water into abundance;
– Women academies where skills become income that defines a woman’s independence. And where women farmers have emerged as fetching symbols of promise and possibility.
These are not projects. They are lifelines.
They are not interventions. They are transformations.
Despite the acute challenges of the year 2024, Dr Siju still stood as a pillar of hope. Her Arise Walk for Life and Arise Conference 2025 held with a powerful mantra, #Grit!
Guests from across the country and indeed the globe poured into the grand ballroom of the Oriental Hotel. They came on numbers to celebrate a Lawyer who’s become a pillar of purpose, a visionary leader who would not let down the hundreds of thousands of women and even men who look up to her every year to hear the sound of Arise Women Conference.
It is therefore no surprise that the world is pausing yet again to honour a woman who has spent years honouring humanity. The World Women Organization recently bestowed on her its prestigious Icon Award, a testimony to her global footprint.
The legendary Ikoyi Club 1938 decorated her with the Amazon Leadership Award, affirming her as a force of grace and influence.
And now, her classmates, the distinguished Class of 1985 Nigerian Law School, Lagos, led by their Chairman, Emeka Ngige, SAN, OFR, are poised to celebrate her. Come December 16, 2025, she will be celebrated as one of their own who has soared with courage, conviction, and unquestionable excellence as they honour her with the Award of Worthy Ambassador of the Class of 1985 Nigerian Law School for her outstanding contributions to the legal profession and humanity.
But long before these new honours arrived, Dr. Siju had already walked a path illuminated by countless recognitions, a constellation of awards that testified to her impact, her compassion, and her unrelenting devotion to humanity.
In recognition of her contributions to legal education and development, the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) Lagos Branch, Nigeria, presented her with a Merit Award.
There is the Award of Recognition presented by the Nigeria Association of Women Journalists ( NAWOJ), the conferment of Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree by the Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko (AAUA), Ogun state, an Award of Recognition and Distinction by Her Excellency, Dr Zainab Bagudu, the First Lady of Kebbi State and her Foundation, Medic Aid, and a special award by the Committee of Wives of Lagos State Officials (COWLSO) for her remarkable humanitarian cause. Still, she was adorned with the Award of Excellence by Her Excellency, Dr Ibijoke Sanwo-Olu, the First Lady of Lagos State, as the Inspirational Woman of the year (2019).
Added to this repertoire of awards is a Recognition Award from the Association of Resident Doctors, Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH, 2022), and the prestigious international Recognition Award by the World Women Icon Award Organization, USA.
Each of these awards is a tender echo of lives she touched and a shining emblem of a life spent uplifting people, empowering women, and shaping communities with grace and grit.
These awards are the world’s answer to her unrelenting sacrifices. They are the accoustics of lives reinvented, families restored, and communities reborn.
Dr. Siju Iluyomade, without doubt, is a phenomenon, a woman of undimmed vision, a heart that refuses to give up on humanity, and a spirit that rises every day with fresh resolve. She is proof that leadership is not a title, but a testimony; not a privilege, but a responsibility; not a spotlight, but a burning lamp carried into dark places.
In celebrating her recent awards, we celebrate what is possible when courage meets compassion and when service becomes a calling. She is more than an icon.
She is a guardian of hope, a builder of possibilities, and a woman whose legacy grows wherever human need meets her resolve.
Fehintolu Faniyi wrote in from Abuja
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