On Thursday, June 5, 2025, close to the Muslim festival of Eid-el-Kabir, Jibril Mohammed Aminu Song, renowned Professor of Medicine (Cardiology) bowed, like all mortals must, to the call of life at 85.

Expectedly, tributes flowed from across the divides both home and abroad. President Bola Tinubu, VP Kashim Shettima, former VP Atiku Abubakar, elder statesmen, governors and other prominent Nigerians have continued to send their eulogies to the memory of a man who participated in shaping Nigeria’s destiny between the 1980s and 2000s.

Born in Song, Adamawa State on August 25, 1939, Aminu was one of the young men who grew up under the influence, tutelage and full sponsorship of post-independence Northern leaders, such as Sir Ahmadu Bello, Northern political patriarch; and Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, Nigeria’s first and only Prime Minister. They were strongly enjoined to “defend the interest of the North” in all their undertakings.

Aminu took this injunction to heart at an early stage. Being exceptionally brilliant academically, he elected to read Medicine at the University of Ibadan “to prove a point”. He graduated in 1965 with a First Class and as the best graduating student. He later bagged PhD in Medicine from the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, London in 1972.

Aminu was the Vice Chancellor of the University of Maiduguri between 1980 and 1985. General Ibrahim Babangida appointed him as Minister of Education. In that post, he championed the quota system in education, nomadic education and the Gifted Child education scheme. He later became Minister of Petroleum and supervised the construction of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, Towers in Abuja.

He was also President of African Petroleum Producers Association, APPA, and President, Organisation of Petroleum Exporters Organisation, OPEC, Conference 1991-1992.

Aminu became a Delegate to the National Constitutional Conference, NCC, 1994 to 1996, where he strongly canvassed in favour of the North’s positions on major issues, especially federal structure and power rotation. He was one of the pioneer leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, on whose platform he won a seat to represent Adamawa Central in the Senate in 2007. But before then, he was appointed Nigeria’s Ambassador to the United States of America in 1999 by President Olusegun Obasanjo, his longstanding bosom friend.

Prof. Aminu was firm, uncompromising and unapologetic in his pro-Fulani, Islam and Northern stands. Ironically, throughout his life he was surrounded by friends and associates from all walks of life in his official, political and domestic affairs. He was generous, accommodating and a jolly good fellow full of scathing wits.

Prof. Aminu, even in his final years, had a photographic memory and felt at home in the company of people from all levels of society. He was a great and versatile achiever.

Our condolences to the family.