Professor Olugbemiro Jegede is the Secretary-General and Chief Executive of the Association of African Universities, a position that he assumed on December 1, 2010 after a successful tenure in Nigeria on a special assignment in Higher Education. Professor Olugbemiro Jegede, at the invitation of the Federal Government of Nigeria to restart open and distance learning activities in Nigeria, was appointed National Coordinator, National Open and Distance Learning Programmes in 2001 and in 2003 as the founding Vice-Chancellor of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN). Prior to his special assignment in Nigeria, Professor Jegede served in various capacities in different parts of the world including taking charge in 1988 of the M.Ed Science Education programme by distance learning at Curtin University of Technology Science and Mathematics Education Centre, Perth, Australia.

He was the founding Head of the Centre for Research and Evaluation Unit Distance Education Centre at The University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba, Australia (1991-97) from where he moved to The Open University of Hong Kong as foundation Director of its Centre for Research in Distance & Adult Learning (CRIDAL) from 1997-2002. He was Manager of the East Asia regional node for the World Bank Global Distance Education Network at its inception in 1998. Professor Jegede holds a M.Ed and a PhD (Science Education) from University College, Wales, UK.