Adeola Eunice Oladele Fayehun (born 6 July 1984) is a

Nigerian Nigerians or the Nigerian people are citizens of Nigeria or people with ancestry from Nigeria. The name Nigeria was derived from the Niger River running through the country. This name was allegedly coined in the late 19th century by British jo ...

journalist who specializes in discussing current geopolitical, social and economic issues that affect the daily lives of Africans living on the continent. She is well known for a controversial 2015 street interview where she and fellow Sahara TV journalist Omoyele Sowore asked

Zimbabwe file:Zimbabwe, relief map.jpg, upright=1.22, Zimbabwe, relief map Zimbabwe, officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Bots ...

an President

Robert Mugabe Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of th ...

when he would be stepping down from office. In 2013, she interviewed former Nigerian President

Goodluck Jonathan Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan (born 20 November 1957) is a Nigerian politician who served as the president of Nigeria from 2010 to 2015. He lost the 2015 presidential election to former military head of state General Muhammadu Buhari and ...

in New York City and asked him what he was doing about the then ongoing

Boko Haram Boko Haram, officially known as Jama'at Ahl al-Sunna li al-Da'wa wa al-Jihad (), is a self-proclaimed jihadist militant group based in northeastern Nigeria and also active in Chad, Niger, northern Cameroon, and Mali. In 2016, the group spli ...

insurgency.

Early life

Fayehun was born in

Nigeria Nigeria, officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of Guinea in the Atlantic Ocean to the south. It covers an area of . With Demographics of Nigeria, ...

. Her parents, Rev. Dr. Solomon Ajayi Oladele and Margaret Ibiladun Oladele (née Abolarin), worked as missionaries in Nigeria. She has five older siblings, and is the youngest child. She comes from Yoruba ethnic group of south-western Nigeria and speaks the language fluently. Adeola began college in Nigeria working toward a degree in linguistics. In 2003, at 19, she moved to the United States to continue college after getting a scholarship through the

National Association of Congregational Christian Churches The National Association of Congregational Christian Churches (NACCC) is an association of 304 churches providing fellowship for and services to churches from the Congregational tradition. The Association maintains its national office in Oak Cree ...

. She graduated from

Olivet College The University of Olivet, formerly known as Olivet College, is a private Christian college in Olivet, Michigan, United States. The college is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission. It was founded in 1844 by missionaries from Oberlin Coll ...

in Olivet,

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

with a

B.A. A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree ...

in Mass Communications and Journalism in 2007. At Olivet she worked in radio and was a writer for the college newspaper. As part of a school project, Fayehun also founded the Olivet College TV Studio. In 2008, Fayehun received a master's degree in broadcast journalism from

CUNY Graduate School of Journalism The Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York is a public graduate journalism school located in New York City, New York, United States. One of the 25 institutions comprising the City University of New York, ...

Career

In 2009, after graduate school, Fayehun worked at

CUNY TV CUNY TV is a non-commercial educational station of the City University of New York, based in New York City. It offers telecourse programming in various subjects ranging from mathematics, physics, and biology to history, art, and social studies ...

as a TV news producer. During this time she wrote and produced a feature on

Sahara Reporters Sahara Reporters is a news agency based in New York City that focuses on promoting citizen journalism by encouraging everyday people to report stories about corruption, human rights abuses and other political misconduct in Africa, with special f ...

's Omoyele Sowore, who she later went on to work with in a behind-the-scenes capacity at

. In 2010, Fayehun became a U.S. correspondent for the Nigerian newspaper, ''

The Nation ''The Nation'' is a progressive American monthly magazine that covers political and cultural news, opinion, and analysis. It was founded on July 6, 1865, as a successor to William Lloyd Garrison's '' The Liberator'', an abolitionist newspaper ...

''. In 2010, Fayehun founded ''African Spotlight'', where she published content about Africa. In April 2011, Fayehun began the news satire program, ''Keeping It Real with Adeola!'' on SaharaTV. The show was 30 minutes long and featured Fayehun reporting, often in character, on various African news events. The focus of the show was on reporting political issues pertinent to Africa and of interest to the

African diaspora The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from List of ethnic groups of Africa, people from Africa. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West Africa, West and Central Africans who were ...

community. For the first 150-plus episodes created over a period of three years, Fayehun was the producer, writer, and editor of the show. In November 2017, Fayehun left SaharaTV to work as an independent creator, publishing new content on her YouTube channel about African politics in a continuation of her weekly satire show ''Keeping It Real with Adeola!''. Often compared to comedian

Jon Stewart Jon Stewart (born Jonathan Stuart Leibowitz, November 28, 1962) is an American comedian, writer, producer, director, political commentator, actor, and television host. The long-running host of ''The Daily Show'' on Comedy Central from 1999 to 20 ...

, Fayehun uses satire and comedy to explain news events in self-produced videos. Fayehun also works as a foreign correspondent for

, a Nigerian national daily newspaper based in

Lagos Lagos ( ; ), or Lagos City, is a large metropolitan city in southwestern Nigeria. With an upper population estimated above 21 million dwellers, it is the largest city in Nigeria, the most populous urban area on the African continent, and on ...

Notable interviews

* 2013: Former Nigerian President

and the

Sovereign wealth fund A sovereign wealth fund (SWF), or sovereign investment fund, is a state-owned investment fund that invests in real and financial assets such as stocks, Bond (finance), bonds, real estate, precious metals, or in alternative investments such as ...

* 2015: Nigerian President

Muhammadu Buhari Muhammadu Buhari (born 17 December 1942) is a Nigerian politician who served as the president of Nigeria from 2015 to 2023. A retired Nigerian army major general, he was the military head of state of Nigeria from 31 December 1983 to 27 Augu ...

on addressing corruption, the Nigerian economy * 2015: Nigerian Vice President

Yemi Osinbajo Oluyemi Oluleke Osinbajo (born 8 March 1957) is a Nigerian lawyer, professor, and politician who served as the 14th vice president of Nigeria from 2015 to 2023. A member of the All Progressives Congress (APC), he previously served as Attorney ...

* 2015: Zimbabwe President

on ending presidency, as he attended the inauguration of the Nigerian President

on 29 May.

Honors

* 2008: Foreign Press Association, New York, NY, "Outstanding Academic And Professional Achievement" * 2014: Ethiopian Satellite News Network (ESAT), Washington DC, "Excellence In Journalism For Democracy Award" * 2015:

, "Best One Woman Show"

Personal life

In 2011, Fayehun married Victor Fayehun in Nigeria. Fayehun and her husband created a non-profit foundation called KIRWA Foundation that provides aid to terminally ill in Africa.

References

External links

* *
Keeping It Real with Adeola!
' {{DEFAULTSORT:Fayehun, Adeola CUNY Graduate School of Journalism alumni Olivet College alumni Nigerian women journalists Yoruba women journalists 1984 births Living people Nigerian YouTubers Nigerian satirists Nigerian expatriates in the United States Nigerian reporters and correspondents Yoruba journalists The Nation