B’Haram: Victims Support Fund Appoints Dr Sunday Ochoche As Executive Director

The Presidential Committee on Victims Support Fund, set up by President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan in July 2014 and chaired by Gen (rtd) TY Danjuma, to enhance funds mobilization and support to victims of insurgency and terrorism in Nigeria, has appointed Dr. Sunday Ochoche as the Executive Director of the Nigeria Foundation for Support of Victims of Terrorism. He has since assumed his role as the Executive Director of the Foundation.

Before his appointment Dr. Ochoche was an Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science and Defense Studies, Nigerian Defense Academy, (NDA) Kaduna.

Dr. Ochoche graduated from the University of Ibadan in 1977 with a second class upper degree in Philosophy; subsequently he obtained his MA and PhD degrees in Peace Studies from the University of Bradford in England in 1981 and 1983 respectively.

Dr. Ochoche’s versatile experience spans over 30 years in senior management in the United Nations system, government and academia. His UN experience covers the Special Political Mission in Somalia; peacekeeping missions in Sierra Leone and Darfur; and UNDP HQ in New York. He was the pioneer Director General of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution, in the Presidency. He was Director of Research and Publications at the National War (now Defence) College, Abuja as well as lecturer in Political Science, University of Jos. His areas of teaching and research include Peace and Conflict Studies, International Relations and Strategic Studies, the military in conflict and state building, conflict analysis, Security Sector Reform, state institutions and post-conflict recovery, the UN in peacebuilding, underdevelopment and instability in developing countries. He is a Fellow of the War College (fwc).

Dr Ochoche has also received international academic fellowships –he was the SSRC-MacArthur Foundation Visiting Individual Fellow to the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, England, from September to November 1987. Two years later between 1989 and October 1991 he was Post-doctoral Fellow of the SSRC-MacArthur Foundation in International Peace and Security Studies, at the Matthew B. Ridgway Centre for International Security Studies, University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania USA.