Managing Director of the Nigerian Ports Authority, Public Servant, Campaigner
Nigeria

Hadiza Bala Usman is the former managing director of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and has spent many years serving her country in congress and numerous public service roles.

Before her appointment as the first female Managing Director of the NPA in its 63 years of existence, Hadiza worked at the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE). She was then hired by the UNDP for the Federal Capital Territory Administration as Assistant to the Minister on project implementation. Her wide-ranging impact in these positions culminated in her appointment as the Chief of Staff to the Executive Governor of Kaduna State, again, the first female to be so appointed in that part of the country.

Hadiza is Vice President of the African Region for the International Association of Ports and Harbors (IAPH). In this role she pursued an aggressive 25-year port development plan that would prepare the NPA for the future of the global maritime industry.

A recipient of many awards in the areas of governance, girl child education and women’s emancipation, she is also convener of the BringBackOurGirls Campaign. This is a global campaign demanding the rescue of the 279 young girls abducted from Chibok Secondary School on 15th April 2014 in Borno State, Nigeria.

Hadiza is an alumnus of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria where she earned a bachelor’s degree (B.Sc.) in Business Administration, and of the University of Leeds where she obtained a post graduate degree in Development Studies. Her numerous accolades include being named one of the the Financial Times’ Most Influential Women of the Year (2014) and one of CNN’s Most Inspiring Women of the Year (2014).