Professor Chinwe Veronica Anunobi and the Library Beyond the Walls

By Bem Max Nomor

“NLN is primarily established as the nation’s memory.”

— Professor Chinwe Veronica Anunobi, speaking at the National Library of Nigeria's 60th anniversary press conference in Abuja, November 2024

When Professor Chinwe Veronica Anunobi reported to the headquarters of the National Library of Nigeria in Abuja on 14 September 2021, she arrived with almost three decades behind her in Nigerian librarianship.

She had worked in university libraries, taught Library and Information Science, supervised research, helped develop digital collections and electronic repositories, risen to professorial rank, and spent six years directing the library of the Federal University of Technology, Owerri (FUTO). Her appointment by President Muhammadu Buhari placed her in charge of an institution responsible for collecting, organising and preserving Nigeria's published heritage.

It also returned her, on a much larger scale, to the work that had occupied much of her career: bringing technology into the library.

Within months, she was setting out an eight-point programme for the National Library. Digitisation followed. So did the National Repository of Nigeria, expanded electronic research services, virtual-library facilities, staff training and renewed campaigns around legal deposit and reading.

From Biology to Librarianship

Anunobi is from Alor in Idemili South Local Government Area of Anambra State. Published accounts provide considerably more information about her professional career than about her childhood and family background.

She studied Biology Education at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, graduating tops of her class in 1991.

After National Youth Service, she became a graduate assistant in a library in 1993. The appointment changed the course of her career.

Between 1995 and 1997, she enrolled in and studied Library and Information Science at Imo State University, Owerri, obtaining a master's degree. She subsequently undertook doctoral studies in Library and Information Science at the University of Nigeria, completing her studies in 2006.

She also received management training at the Galilee International Management Institute in Israel.

Building Digital Libraries

Anunobi worked across several Nigerian institutions, including the Federal University of Technology, Owerri; Imo State University; Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka; and Federal Polytechnic, Nekede.

At FUTO, she was involved in the establishment of an ICT unit, library automation and an electronic theses and dissertations programme. At Nnamdi Azikiwe University, where she worked as a digital librarian, she participated in the development of the university's digital library.

Her academic interests followed the same direction. She wrote and taught on digital libraries, information and communications technology, open access, scholarly communication, information management and the changing use of library resources.

In 2009, she became Deputy University Librarian at Nnamdi Azikiwe University. Four years later, in 2013, she attained professorial rank.

Then, in 2014, she returned to the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, as University Librarian.

Six Years at FUTO

Anunobi served as University Librarian of FUTO from 2014 until April 2021.

During those years, the library expanded its use of automation and electronic services. The university developed FUTOSpace, an institutional repository for scholarly material, while digitisation, electronic access and cloud-based services were incorporated into library operations.

Her administration also introduced research and learning commons and expanded the use of librarians within faculties. The National Library's later biographical account credits her tenure with internal restructuring and more than twenty staff-development programmes.

In 2018, FUTO emerged first in the inaugural Open Educational Resources competition organised by the National Universities Commission. Institutional accounts attributed part of the university's performance to the library programme under Anunobi.

She completed her tenure as University Librarian in April 2021 and returned to Nnamdi Azikiwe University. She would not remain there for long. On 2 September 2021, President Muhammadu Buhari approved Anunobi's appointment as National Librarian and Chief Executive Officer of the National Library of Nigeria.

She succeeded Professor Lenrie Olatokunbo Aina, becoming the seventh National Librarian of Nigeria and the second woman to hold the office.

On 14 September, she formally assumed duty at the National Library's headquarters in Abuja. At her first meeting with management, she spoke of collaboration and of bringing the institution closer to international standards.

Her programme became clearer at an inaugural press conference in Abuja on 10 November 2021. There she outlined the priorities that subsequently formed an eight-point agenda for the institution.

On 30 November, three action committees were inaugurated to begin implementing the programme.

Among the earliest priorities was the condition of the National Library's older collections.

Preserving Fragile Collections

In 2022, the National Library began digitising deteriorating and vulnerable materials in its holdings.

Many were publications whose continued physical handling posed further risks to their survival. Digital copies allowed the originals to be conserved while enabling readers to consult the material electronically. More than 6,000 weak and vulnerable materials were digitised from 2022 onward. The programme developed alongside a larger project.

In September 2022, during activities marking her first year in office, Anunobi announced plans for an electronic national repository through which Nigerian publications and heritage materials could be preserved and accessed digitally.

That project became the National Repository of Nigeria.

The National Repository of Nigeria

The National Repository was deployed in 2023. It provided an electronic platform for Nigerian publications and other documentary resources held or collected by the National Library. More than 1,500 digitised resources had been uploaded during the period covered by the IHS-BiRD & L assessment.

Anunobi's administration also developed a Virtual Library Dashboard linking users to electronic resources, including open-access journals and monographs.

Other systems followed or were expanded. The National Library adopted CLASS WEB and Online Public Access Catalogue services, improved its website, expanded internet connectivity and obtained access to multidisciplinary research databases including ProQuest and EBSCOhost.

These projects extended work Anunobi had already pursued in university librarianship, now applied to the country's principal library institution.

Yet the National Library faced a difficulty that digitisation alone could not solve. Large numbers of Nigerian publications were never reaching it.

The Search for Nigeria's Missing Publications

Nigeria's legal-deposit system requires publishers to submit copies of their publications to the National Library, but compliance has practically been impossible.

At a stakeholders' workshop in Abuja in June 2023, Anunobi disclosed that the institution had received 8,051 titles in 2021 and 5,504 in 2022. She said the figures did not represent all the materials published in Nigeria during those years.

Her administration consequently intensified engagement with publishers, authors, printers, researchers and booksellers.

At a sensitisation programme in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, on 31 October 2022, Anunobi addressed stakeholders on legal deposit and the standardisation of Nigerian publications. Similar appeals became a recurring feature of her tenure.

She also advocated amendment of the legislation governing the National Library, whose principal statutory framework dates from 1970.

Preservation remained another concern. Anunobi repeatedly drew public attention to ageing documentary materials, inadequate storage, funding pressures and the need to safeguard materials before physical deterioration made recovery more difficult.

Her preservation work eventually extended into another area: language.

Indigenous Languages

During the International Decade of Indigenous Languages, 2022–2032, Anunobi became involved in programmes concerned with the preservation and continued use of indigenous languages.

The issue attracted particular attention in 2024, when El País, a prominent, Madrid-based daily Spanish-language newspaper and one of Spain's main national newspapers of record, interviewed her about recurring claims that the Igbo language was facing extinction.

Anunobi rejected attempts to assign a simple extinction date to the language. She instead pointed to problems affecting its transmission and development, including inadequate teaching resources, insufficient research, shortages of teachers, dialect differences and the declining use of Igbo in some homes.

Her international work on indigenous languages continued alongside her National Library responsibilities, eventually including leadership responsibilities connected with UNESCO's decade-long programme.

Within Nigeria, however, another part of her programme concentrated on something more immediate: getting people to read.

Readership and Children

The National Library continued its Readership Promotion Campaign under Anunobi, taking reading programmes into schools and communities across Nigeria.

In 2022, according to the institution's figures, its outreach activities reached more than 4,000 people and 102 secondary schools through books, tablets and related educational materials.

Children's summer camps were organised through branches of the National Library, while outreach programmes targeted rural and hard-to-reach communities. The campaigns also brought the institution into collaboration with public libraries, schools and other education stakeholders.

At the launch of the 2023 Readership Promotion Campaign in Abuja on 20 June 2023, Anunobi again presented reading as a national educational concern rather than an activity confined to libraries.

Her advocacy continued in later years. At the Nigeria International Book Fair in Lagos on 26 May 2026, she argued for wider access to learning opportunities and books for Nigerian children irrespective of their location or circumstances.

In September 2025, the Network of Book Clubs and Reading Culture Promoters in Nigeria presented her with its Champion of Reading Award in Abuja.

Inside the National Library, meanwhile, she was attempting to build the workforce required to support the institution's expanding services.

Training the Librarians

More than one hundred National Library employees were sponsored for professional and specialised training during her first tenure in office as National Librarian.

The administration worked with organisations including the National Information Technology Development Agency on digital-skills training and also pursued programmes relating to emerging technologies and artificial intelligence.

Anunobi placed particular emphasis on the Centre for Advanced Library and Information Management, known as CALIM, in Enugu.

She presided over the centre's maiden matriculation ceremony in May 2023. Later that year, from 6 to 8 November, CALIM hosted a human-capital development programme focused on staff competencies and technological change.

During her tenure, the centre secured full accreditation from the National Board for Technical Education for its diploma programmes. Training activities were expanded, while improvements were made to infrastructure and accommodation for trainees.

Her professional activities were also taking her increasingly outside Nigeria.

Beyond the National Library

Anunobi had long been active in professional library organisations. She represented West Africa on the Governing Council of the African Library and Information Associations and Institutions and participated in the work of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions.

On 30 September 2023, the Nigerian Library Association admitted her as a Fellow and named her among its brand ambassadors during an event at the National Defence College in Abuja.

In June 2025, she was elected First Vice-Chair of the Conference of Directors of National Libraries for a two-year term, bringing her into the leadership of an international network of national library directors.

A year later, in June 2026, she was elected to the Governing Board of the ISSN International Centre, the international organisation responsible for the system used to identify serial publications.

Her work on indigenous languages also acquired an international dimension through UNESCO-associated programmes.

In May 2026, the Institute for Historical Studies, Biographical Research, Documentation, and Legacy (IHS-BiRD & L) named her for conferment of the Grand Legacy Laureate of Public Service, citing her record in digital transformation, preservation, literacy promotion, research access and institutional development.

Work Still in Progress

Anunobi's tenure has not removed the longstanding constraints facing the National Library. The institution continues to deal with shortages of staff, financial pressures, preservation needs and accommodation problems. Legal-deposit compliance remains incomplete, leaving gaps in the collection of Nigerian publications.

The scale of digitisation also remains small when set against the size and age of the National Library's complete holdings. Thousands of materials have been digitised, but many more still require conservation and electronic preservation.

The unfinished National Library headquarters in Abuja is another problem inherited from earlier administrations. Its history predates Anunobi's appointment by many years and remains part of the institutional environment in which she has had to operate.

In April 2026, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu approved a second and final five-year term for Professor Chinwe Veronica Anunobi as the Chief Executive Officer of the National Library of Nigeria

Her tenure is therefore still a continuing chapter rather than a completed record.

A Career in Nigerian Librarianship

Anunobi entered library work in 1993 as a graduate assistant. She subsequently became a specialist in digital librarianship, a university administrator, a professor of Library and Information Science, University Librarian at FUTO and, in 2021, National Librarian of Nigeria.

Across those appointments, certain subjects have recurred: electronic information, digital repositories, preservation, professional training and access to knowledge.

At Nnamdi Azikiwe University, they appeared in digital-library work. At FUTO, they appeared in automation, electronic resources and FUTOSpace. At the National Library, they have appeared in the digitisation of vulnerable collections, the National Repository of Nigeria, virtual-library services and efforts to strengthen the country's legal-deposit system.

Three decades after entering a library almost by accident, Anunobi found herself responsible for the institution charged with preserving what Nigeria publishes.

The work remains unfinished. So does her tenure.

But the journey from Biology Education at Nsukka to the National Library in Abuja has placed her within one of the major changes in modern Nigerian librarianship: the movement of the library from a predominantly physical collection towards an institution in which preservation and access increasingly take place in both physical and digital form.

References

“Welcome Address of the National Librarian/Chief Executive Officer, Professor Chinwe Veronica Anunobi at the Flag-off of the 2023 Annual Readership Promotion Campaign.” National Repository of Nigeria, https://nigeriareposit.nln.gov.ng/items/6902ceae-5761-4864-8b90-dcfcd1eb54e0/

“Welcome Address … at the Sensitization Workshop on ‘Standardization of Cultural Heritage Publications and Legal Deposit Obligations.’” National Repository of Nigeria, Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, https://nigeriareposit.nln.gov.ng/items/9c7173fe-fe9c-477d-9c0f-e1031e68d609/

Eze, Promise, “Cómo un bulo sobre su posible desaparición termina protegiendo el idioma igbo en Nigeria.” El País, 20 October 2024. An independent international source containing Anunobi's comments on Igbo, language transmission, teaching resources and preservation. https://elpais.com/planeta-futuro/2024-10-20/como-un-bulo-sobre-su-posible-desaparicion-termina-protegiendo-el-idioma-igbo-en-nigeria.html

“Brief Profile of Professor Chinwe Anunobi.” Office of the National Librarian/CEO. https://www.nln.gov.ng/officeofnl.php

“Stakeholders in the Book Industry Urged to Comply with Legal Deposit Law.” 13 June 2023. https://www.nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=59&title=+Stakeholders+in+the+Book+Industry+Urged+to+Comply+with+Legal+Deposit+Law+&utm

“Library: A Fulcrum to Quality Education – Prof. Chinwe Anunobi.” 14 March 2023. https://nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=55&title=Library:+A+Fulcrum+to+Quality+Education+-+Prof.+Chinwe+Anunobi&utm.

“National Librarian Pays Courtesy Call on the Clerk to National Assembly.” 10 August 2023. https://www.nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=66&title=National+Librarian+Pays+Courtesy+Call+on+the+Clerk+to+National+Assembly&utm

“Nigeria Library Association Appoints Anunobi, Others as Fellows, Brand Ambassadors.” 27 November 2023. https://www.nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=69&title=Nigeria+Library+Association+Appoints+Anunobi,+Others+as+Fellows,+Brand+Ambassadors&utm

“NBRP Honours Prof. Anunobi.” 30 September 2025. Records the Champion of Reading Award, presented at the Network of Book Clubs and Reading Culture Promoters in Nigeria conference in Abuja on 25 September 2025.

“Every Nigerian Child Deserves Opportunity to Learn and Dream Big – Prof. Anunobi.” 26 May 2026. https://nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=112&title=NBRP+Honours+Prof.+Anunobi++++&utm

“Nigeria's National Librarian to Lead Global Indigenous Language Initiative.” 29 May 2026. https://nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=124&title=Nigeria%E2%80%99s+National+Librarian+to+Lead+Global+Indigenous+Language+Initiative&utm

“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu Approves the Renewal of the Tenure of NLN DG.” 25 May 2026; reproducing the presidential statement dated 22 April 2026. https://www.nln.gov.ng/news-details.php?post_Id=120&title=%C2%A0++President+Bola+Ahmed+Tinubu+approves+the+renewal+of+the+tenure+of+NLN+DG++%C2%A0&utm

National Virtual Library of Nigeria. https://virtuall.nln.gov.ng/?utm

“National Librarian, Prof. Chinwe Veronica Anunobi Speaking about RPC 2024.” National Repository of Nigeria, 2024. https://nigeriareposit.nln.gov.ng/items/9279716b-5717-4e3a-82d6-266c6c8f979f/full?utm

Justification for the Conferral of the Grand Legacy Laureate of Public Service (GLLPS) upon Professor Chinwe Veronica Anunobi. IHS-BiRD & L Instrument No. 2025/GLLPS/01-05. https://ihsbirdl.org.ng/storage/orders/documents/ygPRS8OBvbGuel8yNh0sAvrZNpPDq28Y56s1rHCc.pdf