THE Board of Directors of Hygeia Group has appointed Mrs. Fola Laoye as its new Chairman with effect from January 1, 2012.

The new Chairman will succeed Prof. E. A. Elebute who will retire from the Board on December 31st, 2011.  According to a statement, Mrs. Fola Laoye presently serves as the Group Managing Director of Hygeia.

She is a holder of Bachelors Degree in Accounting and a Masters Degree (Business Administration) from Harvard Business School, Cambridge, USA.

She has over 20 years of business experience, both locally and internationally, having trained with Ernst and Young, Lagos and Price WaterHouseCoopers, London.

Laoye joined Hygeia in July 1999 and during this time she has been responsible for mobilising resources for Health, including commercial capital and donor funds, and has created more than 450 jobs.

The statement by the company described Laoye as a Trustee of the Hygeia Foundation, which is currently focused on building both clinical and managerial skills of healthcare providers in Nigeria.

She is also a member of the Board of Pensions Alliance (PAL), a Nigerian Pension Fund Administrator and member of the Board of Results for Development Institute (R4D), a US-based health and education think-tank, funded by Rockefeller Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Elebute, the outgoing Chairman and Founder of Hygeia Group, has been involved in the Nigerian healthcare environment for over 45 years.

The outgoing chairman has contributed immensely to the evolution of both Public and Private Healthcare and remains an icon in the Nigerian Healthcare Industry.

He was previously the Provost of the College of Medicine of University of Lagos and the Chief Medical Director of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital.

Elebute also served as Chairman of the Board of Management of University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan and consequent upon this appointment he was elected the Chairman of the Committee of Chairmen of the Federal Government’s 53 tertiary hospitals.