Rahman Ipaye, a former Special Assistant on Legal Matters to the national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, was on Thursday named as President Muhammadu Buhari’s Deputy Chief of Staff.

This is coming following the backlash and outcry that greeted his last appointment.

President Muhammadu appointed Mr Ipaye to pacify the South-West.

Ipaye was assigned to the office of the Vice President as Prof Yemi Osinbajo’s Chief of Staff.

Both Osinbajo and Ipaye have come a long way from the University of Lagos as lecturers and when the VP was the Attorney General for Lagos state.

He was Osinbajo’s Special Assistant when the VP was Commissioner for Justice and Attorney General in Lagos State in the Tinubu administration.

Ipaye studied at the University of Lagos where he graduated with B.A. (Hons) Degree (1984); LL.B. Hons (1988) and LL.M. (1991). He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria and the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators respectively. He is also a Notary Public for Nigeria.

He started his career as a legal practitioner and research co-ordinator in the law firm of Oditah, Adebiyi & Co., Ikoyi, Lagos before joining the Faculty of Law, University of Lagos as an Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Commercial and Industrial Law (April 1992). He eventually rose to the position of Senior Lecturer in October 1999 and Sub Dean of Law in October 2000.

In May 2001, Ipaye took a leave of absence to join the then Lagos State Governor (Bola Ahmed Tinubu) as Special Assistant on Legal Matters. He also served as Senior Special Assistant on Legal Matters (2003 to 2007); and Special Adviser to Governor Fashola on Taxation and Revenue (2007 to 2011) before he was appointed as Lagos State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice.