Dr. Jeffrey Onyejefu Isima (DJI)
President & Founder
Jeffrey Isima Foundation (JIF)
Early Life
Dr. Jeff was born in Igah-Okpaya in Apa Local Government Area (LGA) of Benue State in central Nigeria to working-class parents. His father, Mr. John Eluma Isima, was a primary school teacher, a Methodist lay preacher and local politician, while his mother, Mary Ene Isima, owned a small business and went on to work as Nursery Farm Attendant with the Apa Local Government Council, Ugbokpo, until her retirement. The late John Eluma was a native of Ugbokpo, though his own mother (Jeff’s grandmother) was Agbaduma from Odejo and had close families still living in Ichogolugwu, both in Agatu LGA. Jeff’s mother, Mrs. Mary Ene Isima, is a native of Ikobi in Apa LGA.
After his childhood years in Igah-Okpaya and Ojinebe – Adoka, where his father taught, 11-year old Jeff was settled with the family in his native town of Ugbokpo, following the transfer of his father to the nearby village of Ojantelle in 1980. As a result, much of Jeff’s adolescence was spent in Ugbokpo, where he attended the Government Comprehensive Secondary School and lived for about a decade and a half. In 1994, Jeff went on to further his education at the premier Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, in southwest Nigeria, where he graduated with Bachelor of Science in International Relations in 1998. Upon completion of his mandatory post-graduate National Youth Service Scheme (NYSC) in Buguma, Rivers State in Nigeria’s Niger Delta in 2000, Jeff won a full post-graduate scholarship from the Government of the Netherlands under the Netherlands Fellowship Programme (NPF). He left Nigeria in 2001 to further his education in that country and graduated with MA Development Studies, with specialisation in Local and Regional Development (LRD), from the prestigious Institute of Social Studies (ISS), The Hague, in 2002. By the end of that year, Jeff won another full scholarship from the United Kingdom (UK) cross- department Global Conflict Prevention Pool (GCPP) and moved to Shrivenham in Southwest UK to study for his doctorate degree in Security Studies at the Cranfield University, one of the 10 foremost British universities. He also worked as Research Officer with the GCPP project on Global Facilitation Network for Security Sector Reform (GFN-SSR). Just a year to completing his doctorate study, Jeff lost his aging father, who transited peacefully in his sleep without illness in 2006.
The painful passage of his father gave Jeff a stronger impetus to an already burning passion to return home and fight to build a society that works for all, and not just for a powerful few. Earlier, the functioning of government to serve the people effectively in advanced democracies had caught Jeff’s inner most attention during his scholarship and sojourning overseas, involving much traveling across Europe. In particular, his MA research in The Hague exposed him to what makes local governments work from diverse case studies across the globe. Study tours to integrated modern farms and auctions, and observation of city marketing and participatory budgeting processes had left Jeff with this secret question:
why can’t this happen in my locality?
This question inspired Jeff to focus his MA thesis research on Collective Action for Downward Accountability in Apa Local Government of his home state of Benue. The thesis, which was published by the university, is the first and, most probably, the only intellectual research on local governance in the Apa/Agatu Federal Constituency of Nigeria.
Jeff, who bagged his doctorate in July 2007, has worked as an academic and a diplomat for over 15 years across many countries, spanning 5 continents, and has acquired a formidable global experience in security and development. Driven by the unquenchable passion to make government work for the masses, Jeff is vying to represent the people of his constituency in the Nigeria Federal House of Representatives in 2007. Such representation would enable him effectively deploy his arsenal of extensive global experience and connections for local development by utilising the levers of public policymaking to connect his rural constituency to vital resources that only the Federal Government can provide.
Achievements
Humanitarian intervention: Jeff pioneered a medical outreach project in Apa LGA in February 2022. A first of its kind in the Apa/Agatu Federal Constituency, the pilot was implemented by the Jeffrey Isima Foundation (JIF) and involved free eye-checks for hundreds of residents and provision of basic eye treatment measures to those who needed them. The testimonials have been so overwhelming that JIF has decided to scale up and expand the project, while making medical outreach one of its core standing programmes.
Community Empowerment:
Dr. Jeff has implemented various projects to empower poor communities across the Apa/Agatu Federal Constituency since 2022. Some of these projects include the following:
Research & Publication
Dr. Jeff is an accomplished intellectual who has published extensively on security and development questions. Some of his widely read works include, but not limited to, the following:
Dr. Jeff, who lost his dear mother in January 2023, is a God-fearing, people-loving, responsible family man, and is blessed with a wife and three (3) children (two boys and one girl).