
ENG. OKU KANAYO
Eng. Oku Kanayo is Co-Founder and Director of Freedom International Schools – Africa (FISA) in Kenya. FISA blends Afrocentrism and the global International Baccalaureate curriculum, and is the first Afrocentric and Global school in the world. Oku was born and raised in Asaba, Delta state, Nigeria. He holds a BSc in Computer Engineering from the University of Benin, Nigeria, and an MSc in Computer Engineering from Dalana University, Sweden. His prowess in marketing and software engineering has seen him work as an ICT consultant and business strategist for Virgin Media and Hewlett Packard in the UK. However, these professional accomplishments outside Africa are just a tip of the gargantuan giftedness that Oku has. It is through relocating back to Africa in 2014 that his true purpose in life was established. In 2014, Oku and his wife Utheri officially founded Children in Freedom, an NGO that gave scholarships to children from humble backgrounds. Oku quickly realized that paying school fees was not enough, as the children had low self-efficacy and struggled to dream and project a positive future for themselves. He designed an Afrocentric mentorship curriculum called Mentorship for Freedom (MFF), whose main goal was to teach the children to embrace their cultural heritage and identity; to love and value themselves as black Africans
and appreciate the wealth of their continent. MFF delved into true and positive African histories and revealed the greatness of African thought and innovations. MFF soon morphed into a school, and in 2017, he put together a construction team and built with his own hands, the first classrooms of FISA. Oku is a polymath, and an extremely gifted individual with high emotional intelligence and discernment. He has the ability to ‘feel things’ and has led FISA
into unchartered territories. He is ruggedly brave and takes risks that many would not. He dreams big for the African child and has the gift of turning his vision into Afrocentric curriculum that is implemented at FISA. Oku has used his ICT expertise to implement ambitious ICT programmes from kindergarten to high school, including learning to code using HTML, Java and Python. He is proud that FISA has so far won the first ReimaginED Liberatory Learning Award, the 2022 MASK School Prize, and 2023 DIAR Award for Most Inclusive Social Enterprise. In 2023, FISA was shortlisted as a Top 10 school worldwide, by the World’s Best School Prizes. Oku is a great cook and personally trains the school’s kitchen staff; indeed FISA is famous for its delicious food.