QHSES Leadership Academy has marked five years of human capacity building, graduating 1,966 students since its maiden class in 2022 as it expands access to professional and leadership development in Nigeria and beyond.
The academy’s graduate numbers have risen from 94 to 272 in 2023, when 10 visually impaired persons graduated. It produced 238 graduates in 2024 and 643 in 2025, including 54 who finished with distinctions, before graduating another 719 students at its fifth anniversary convocation in 2026.
Founded as a tuition-free social innovation academy, the institution said its human capacity building programmes are designed to equip young people and graduates with professional skills, leadership capacity and a social innovation mindset while contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals.
Its fifth convocation in Lagos provided another measure of that growth, with 719 students graduating from the 2026 class. The academy received 3,617 applications for the cohort, from which 1,594 students matriculated.
What began as a vision to remove economic barriers to professional education has also expanded beyond Nigeria. The 2026 cohort included participants from Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Germany, the United States, Britain and Canada.
Jamiu Badmos, Founder and Visioneer of QHSES Leadership Academy, popularly known as the Jagaban of Safety in Africa, said the academy was built on the belief that talent should not be denied an opportunity to develop because of economic circumstances.
‘At our Academy, we believe that education is the greatest catalyst for human transformation and societal progress,’ Badmos said. ‘Exceptional ability exists in every community, but access to opportunity should never be determined by economic circumstances.’
The academy, he said, has sought to combine technical and professional development with integrity, critical thinking, social responsibility, innovation and leadership.
‘We are not thinking locally. We are thinking globally. We are also acting globally,’ Badmos said.
The 2026 graduating class also recorded a first for the five-year-old institution. Oderemi Olufunke Mary, a mother of twins who was pursuing a master’s degree in biomedical engineering at the University of Ilorin while completing the programme, became its first female overall best graduating student.
‘We didn’t get here because it was easy,’ Oderemi said. ‘We got here because we refused to give up even when things got uncomfortable.’
The academy’s emphasis on widening access was also reflected in Okeoghene Jane Akpaeva, a visually impaired student who graduated with distinction.
‘The Academy did not just educate me. They created an accessible environment for me to learn, compete on equal ground,’ Akpaeva said. ‘True inclusion is not charity. It is an equal opportunity.’
Simeon Adebayo Oladipo, Immediate Past Dean of the Faculty of Education, University of Lagos, said institutions developing competent young people would be important to Nigeria’s future.
‘The future of this country will be determined, for better or worse, by what we do with this extraordinary concentration of young energy, young ambition and young talent,’ Oladipo said.
Former Lagos West Senator Ganiyu Olanrewaju Solomon, who served as Grand Leader of the Day, called for greater support for the academy’s tuition-free model and pledged to help extend its training opportunities to Mushin.
The convocation ended with awards and more than N5 million in cash prizes to outstanding graduating students. Students also showcased talents, businesses and practical innovations, including projects that turned discarded materials into useful products.
For the academy, the fifth anniversary marked another stage in a journey it says is centred on building people rather than merely awarding certificates.
‘The true measure of an institution is not the number of certificates it awards, but the number of lives it transforms, the leaders it develops, and the legacy it leaves for generations to come,’ Badmos said.