Distinguished by his intellect and exceptional leadership skills, Mustapha Gidado continues to exemplify a progressive growth path in his chosen public health career. Rising from a medical officer to a training coordinator and a- one time acting principal of the National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Training Institute Zaria, where he managed over 200 staff, Mustapha Gidado joined KNCV as the Senior Technical Advisor-programmes in 2012.  In what seemed like a geometric progression, by 2014 he already became the substantive Country representative of KNCV overseeing four projects including the USAID funded Challenge TB project for which he also doubled as the country director. He managed over 70 staff while in KNCV Nigeria. He is currently the new Director of the global Challenge TB (CTB) project leveraging on his ample experience with USAID through the TB CARE 1, current Challenge TB Project and working with various government systems and funding partners such as the Global Fund.

Mustapha obtained his first degree in medicine from the prestigious Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) Zaria during which time he developed and perfected his astute leadership skills, which has become synonymous with his name. He achieved this through active participation in student unionism- commanding positive changes in favour of the ordinary student. He holds a Masters degree in public health from ABU Zaria and an additional Masters degree in Medical Education from Maastricht University in the Netherlands. Mustapha Gidado, will soon receive a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree on infectious disease epidemiology from Walden University, USA.  He has undergone so many other trainings including training on TB Infection control and Engineering design from Havard School of Public health and on TB/HIV from Sundalo, Italy. He has done various consultancy trainings on Leadership, Project Management and Education in various countries in Africa and Asia

Mustapha Gidado has contributed immensely to development. He has over 26 publications on TB & Leprosy in international and national journals with over 64 international conference abstracts/presentations on different thematic areas of TB control and HIV. He has contributed to over 15 books. He has been opportuned since 2007 to either be a faculty member for post graduate studies or a speaker in a symposium with the union without missing a single year.  He has chaired and co-chaired during Union conference presentations and reviews abstracts for the union conference and also manuscripts sent to the Union journal for publication. You would find contributions from Gidado on most if not all the National documents on TB and leprosy control in Nigeria. He supported the development of TB infection control plans for many health care facilities in Nigeria and 3Is training materials. Mustapha is a resource person to a number of universities in Nigeria and a faculty member to Harvard School of Public Health on Infection control trainings.

Thus far Mustapha Gidado has used his intellect to impart knowledge on people and his leadership abilities to motivate them to greater heights in their respective fields. These are meritorious qualities, which have earned him the current international position the Nigerian nation is proud of and celebrates.