Abel Olumuyiwa Enitan will take over as Head of the Civil Service of the Federation on August 27, 2026, replacing Didi Esther Walson-Jack who retires after reaching the statutory age of 60. The presidency announced the appointment in a statement released on August 19, 2026, through Bayo Onanuga, the president’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy.
The statement named Enitan as the most senior permanent secretary in the federal service and tasked him with consolidating reforms already under way. “ Enitan brings considerable institutional experience and a deep understanding of how the Federal Civil Service works to his new responsibility,” the statement reads in part. The president directed the incoming head to deepen professionalism and efficiency and to help build a more responsive service able to deliver the administration’s Renewed Hope Agenda.
Enitan arrives with more than three decades in public service and a lengthy senior-administrative record. Born on December 12, 1966, he was educated in Ibadan and Ile-Ife before earning a Bachelor of Science in Finance and Banking from the University of Lagos in 1988. He later completed a Master of Science in Public Policy Analysis at Nasarawa State University in 2015.
His career trajectory moved steadily through the federal bureaucracy to the permanent secretary rank, a post he has held for seven years and seven months. During that period he has served in the Ministry of Police Affairs, the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, and within the Office of the Vice President. In September 2023 he became permanent secretary at the then Federal Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, and in March 2025 he moved to the Federal Ministry of Education, assuming office on March 27, 2025.
The shift puts Enitan in charge of the civil service’s administrative machinery rather than a single ministry, and his role will include coordinating reform, enforcing rules that govern federal staff, and overseeing policies that affect civil servants across ministries, departments and agencies. His appointment arrives amid broader moves affecting public servants, including a February push by the Securities and Exchange Commission to encourage greater capital market participation among civil servants, and an April federal approval of increased allowances and welfare benefits for the public service.
President Tinubu also used the announcement to thank Walson-Jack for her reforms and years of service, and to wish her a fulfilling retirement. Enitan inherits a reform-focused mandate and will assume office on August 27, 2026, charged with translating presidential priorities into administrative change across the federal civil service.
