Board of Directors

Mr. Foluso Olajide Phillips was appointed to the Board of Directors of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited as an Independent Non-Executive Director in April 2022 and was elected Chairman of the Bank’s Board of Directors, effective 21^st May 2022.

Mr. Phillips is a qualified industrial economist a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants of the United Kingdom and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria. He has over 45 years’ experience in financial and cost management, industrial and operations management, Human Capital Management, Information Technology systems implementation and Business Management consulting.

He is a private sector leader with experience in consulting, advising, guiding, and mentoring organisations in the private and the public sectors. He has worked with and advised government and its many agencies, at national and state level in his professional capacity as a management consultant, a one-time leader and current Director of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG) and member of other professional bodies and institutions. He continues to play a major role in the private sector through the firm of Phillips Consulting Limited and its affiliate companies – Phillips Outsourcing Limited and Phillips HMO where he serves as Executive Chairman.

He is committed to African Renaissance and is active in supporting Pan-African initiatives in different areas of endeavour. He is also a public speaker who has been actively involved in many international seminars and conferences across Africa, Europe and the United States of America.

Mr. Phillips is married with children and grandchildren.

Ayodeji Adelagun ‘Deji’ was appointed Acting Chief Executive Officer, Nigeria in January 2026. Prior to that, he was the Executive Director and Head of Markets Nigeria & Africa and Rates and Credit Trading, West-Africa.

Deji joined Standard Chartered Bank in 2007. He is a distinguished banking and financial markets executive with over 26 years of experience driving sustained performance, institutional transformation, and market development across Africa. He is widely recognised for his ability to combine deep markets expertise with intentional culture and people leadership—embedding the right values, behaviours, and governance frameworks to deliver stellar results over long periods and through multiple market cycles.

He currently serves as Board Chairman of Standard Chartered Capital and Advisory Nigeria (SCCAN), Board Executive Director of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria, and Head of Markets Africa. In these roles, Ayodeji shapes the bank’s regional markets agenda while providing strong board-level oversight across governance, risk, talent, and strategy. His leadership integrates commercial discipline with people development, enabling teams to perform at a high level while maintaining resilience, trust, and regulatory credibility.

Ayodeji has a proven track record of building high-performing, diverse teams across multiple African markets. He is known for creating performance-oriented cultures that align strategy, risk management, and accountability, while actively mentoring future leaders. His leadership philosophy recognises culture as a critical enabler of execution—ensuring that strong results are not episodic, but repeatable and sustainable. He championed leadership development, succession planning, and values-based decision-making demonstrating his belief that culture is a competitive advantage.

Earlier in his career, Ayodeji played a pivotal role in shaping Nigeria’s financial markets infrastructure. As a Fellow of the Financial Markets Dealers Association (FMDA), he led the workstream that introduced benchmark bonds in Nigeria, helping to deepen the domestic bond market and support Nigeria’s inclusion in the JP Morgan Emerging Markets Index. He also pioneered bond trading desks at FSDH and Standard Chartered Bank, reinforcing market liquidity, structure, and institutional capability. Prior to joining FSDH, Deji worked with the Banking Operations, Commercial Banking and Treasury units of Access Bank Plc.

Ayodeji brings to leadership roles a rare combination of strategic foresight, operational discipline, and people leadership. He is deeply committed to governance excellence, strong regulatory relationships, and the development of the next generation of African financial services leaders.

He holds an MBA from Lagos Business School and a BSc in Economics from the University of Ilorin and is an alumnus of IESE Business School’s Executive Management Programme with executive training from INSEAD. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN) and the ACI Financial Markets Association.

Mrs Adiba Ighodaro was appointed to the Board of Directors of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited as an Independent Non-Executive Director in April 2021.

Prior to her appointment, she was a founding member and Partner of Actis, a Global Private Equity Firm, where she established and managed both its Nigeria and US offices. Mrs Ighodaro has a strong track record in international markets and finance with over 30 years’ experience in legal structuring, development finance, private equity origination, investment and fundraising. She received the 2019 Private Equity Africa special recognition award for being one of the top women deal makers and fundraisers in the industry, recognising leadership over the previous decade and positive impact on women. Mrs Ighodaro is an advocate for diversity and inclusion. During her time at Actis, she initiated the firm’s D&I agenda and was a founding member of Actis’ D&I committee. Mrs Ighodaro also established and chaired the Actis Female Network. Mrs Ighodaro’s board expertise spans the UK and Africa with board positions in UK FTSE 100 & 250 companies and pan-African businesses. Mrs Ighodaro holds a Bachelor of Laws degree from King’s College London and a Diploma in Accounting & Finance from the ACCA. She is also called to the Nigerian Bar and the English Bar (Gray’s Inn).

Dr. Markie Idowu (Markie) was appointed to the Board of Directors of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited as an Independent Non-Executive Director in December 2024.

With an extensive career in the Nigerian banking and financial technology industries, Markie has held pivotal roles in institutions such as Guaranty Trust Bank, Fidelity Bank and Polaris Bank. She has also worked as a Consultant in Information Technology and Finance.

Markie has served on the board of several companies such as Polaris Bank, MainOne Cable Company, Equity Assurance, IHS, Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System, Mainstreet Brokers Limited and Xpress Payment Solutions. She currently serves as a Director on the board of the Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Company and NSIA Insurance. She also chaired the Women in Technology in Nigeria Advisory Board from 2023 to 2024.

Markie holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science, a Master’s Degree in Software Engineering, a Master’s Degree in Business Administration and a doctorate in Credit Management.

Bisi Lamikanra was appointed as a Non-Executive Director of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited in March 2021.

Prior to her appointment, Bisi was a Partner and Head of Advisory Services in KPMG Nigeria, with responsibility for the Advisory Practice in Africa. She has over 36 years of professional experience, providing advisory services to various public and private sector clients including consumer/industrial markets, manufacturing, energy and natural resources, technology and financial services within Nigeria and across Africa. During her time with KPMG Nigeria, she pioneered and built several new service lines such as payment services, data analytics, digital transformation, customer solutions, amongst others.

Bisi is passionate about developing people and recently established a Non- Governmental Organisation focused on providing employability training to recent graduates. She studied Economics at the University of Lagos and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria.

Bisi is married with 1 child and is based in Lagos, Nigeria.

Dayo Omolokun is the Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer, responsible for leading the Finance function in Nigeria. As an organisational leader and key member of senior management, he balances the responsibilities of stewardship with business partnership; constantly improving shareholder value through strategy execution and business risks mitigation. He also manages investor and key regulatory relationships.

Dayo is a seasoned finance and banking professional with over two decades of multi-functional and international experience in Africa, Middle East and UK markets. In his immediate past role as Director of Financial Integration and Change Management at Atlas Mara, Dayo managed aspects of the organisation’s strategy to achieve growth through mergers and acquisitions. Prior to this, he worked for Standard Chartered in various roles in Nigeria, UK, Botswana and Ghana, during which he made specific contributions to the growth of the business as Country Chief Financial Officer and executed a global acquisition and integration project at the Group Head Office. He has also been an Independent Consultant to African Development Bank on Non-Sovereign Operations (private sector investments). He trained with Arthur Andersen Nigeria (now KPMG Professional Services) rising to the position of Audit and Business Advisory Manager.

Dayo earned an Executive MBA from Cass Business School, City, University of London (UK), and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife (Nigeria). He possesses chartered accounting and tax qualifications. He is married with children.

Siji Adeyinka is the Head of Compliance for Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria. He joined the bank in 2011 as Head of Conduct Financial Crime and Compliance. He is an Executive Director and sits on the Board of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria. He is also the Executive Compliance Officer of the Bank.

In this role, Siji provides leadership, subject matter expertise and strategic direction to the Compliance and Financial Crimes Compliance team and also guidance to the local board in Nigeria on Regulatory and Financial Crimes Compliance risk issues.

Siji has over 30 years extensive banking experience spanning various areas such as Finance, Trade Operations, Domestic Operations, Technology and Internal Control.

His working life began in 1988 in Coopers and Lybrand (now PricewaterhouseCoopers) where he trained as a Chartered Accountant before migrating into the banking industry 5 years later. He worked in Citibank Nigeria in the Finance department before joining First City Monument Bank and rising to become the Group Head of Operations and Technology and later the Chief Compliance Officer.

He holds a first degree in Economics from the University of Wolverhampton, UK (1987) and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (FCA). He is also a Fellow of the Compliance Institute of Nigeria (FCIN), an Associate Member of the Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria (ACIN), an Honorary Senior Member of the Chartered institute of Bankers (HCIB) and a Member of the Institute of Directors (MIoD).

Sola Mabadeje is Head, Legal and Company Secretary for Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited.

In her role as Head, Legal, she is responsible for the strategic identification, mitigation and management of legal risks for the Bank. As Company Secretary, she is responsible for ensuring that proper corporate governance structures are in place and that the Bank complies with statutory and regulatory requirements in Nigeria.

She is a seasoned legal professional with over 20 years’ experience and has advised financial institutions and large corporations on complex legal matters, commercial and capital market transactions and corporate governance issues. Prior to joining Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited in 2018, Sola was the Corporate Governance Executive at Old Mutual Nigeria, where she led the Legal, Compliance and Company Secretarial teams from 2014 to 2017. Her career within the financial services industry started in 2002 when she joined Ecobank Nigeria Limited. She later moved to Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited in 2009, where she rose to deputise for and acted as Head, Legal and Company Secretariat before her departure in 2014.

Sola holds a Law degree from the University of Buckingham, a Master’s degree from the University of London and is called to the Nigerian Bar. She is an Associate of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators and an Honorary Senior Member of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria.

Mr. Akhil Mahesh (Akhil) joined the Board of Directors of Standard Chartered Bank Nigeria Limited as a Non-Executive Director in July 2025. He also serves as a Director on the Board of Directors of Standard Chartered Bank Tanzania Limited and Standard Chartered Bank Zimbabwe Limited.

Akhil joined Standard Chartered Bank in 1993 and has held several senior Risk and Business roles in Corporate Banking, Financial Institutions and Public Sector business. His roles have included Head of Risk, United Arab Emirates; Head of Corporate Banking, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait; Region Head, Banks and Brokers Dealers, Africa and Middle East amongst others. He is currently the Head of Governance and Strategic Projects for Africa and Middle East.

Before joining Standard Chartered Bank, Akhil worked at ANZ Grindlays Bank, India and National Bank of Oman in various Front Office and Relationship roles.

He holds a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering and a Post Graduate Diploma in Management.