Mo Abudu

She lives in Lagos with her son and daughter born out of a short-lived marriage to Tokunbo Abudu. She is very close to her children and loves quality time with them whenever she is at home.

Her work is quite demanding due to which she does a lot of travelling around Africa, to Europe and the United States. In all her work she has always championed the cause of the people of her motherland.

Mo Abudu was born on 11 September 1964 in London, to Nigerian parents who originally belonged to the Ondo state. She was the eldest of three sisters. Her parents relocated to Nigeria when she was seven years old and they began to live in Lagos. From there she visited her grandparents who lived on a cocoa farm in Ondo State and learnt about Nigerian culture. She attended Fiwasaye Girls Grammar School in Nigeria till the age of 11.

Her father died when she was 12 years old, after which she returned to the UK for further studies. She attended Hammersmith County Secondary School and moved on to the Ridgeway School in Kent, where she lived with her local guardian in the affluent township of Tunbridge Wells.

She went on to West Kent College and Mid Kent College before she completed her master’s degree in Human Resource Management from the University of Westminster, London. She is also qualified in occupational and personality testing and a member of the British Psychological Society.

During her days in the university and shortly thereafter, she had a brief modelling stint. However, having done her master’s in HR she started her career as a recruitment consultant in the UK in 1987. Later she joined the Starform Group and managed their Corporate Credit Management Exhibition for two years.

From 1993 to 2000 she worked for Arthur Andersen and headed the Human Resources and Training unit for Esso Exploration & Production Nigeria Limited. She valued this exposure as in gave her the understanding of the corporate world that helped her with her own business endeavours later in life, when she relocated to Nigeria.

She went on to establish her own human resources development company called Vic Lawrence & Associates Limited (VLA). One of her projects was to develop an executive training centre at the Protea Hotel in Oakwood Park, Lagos.

She was in her late twenties and her children were entering their teens, when she decided to make a complete shift in her career from HR to media and show business. In her opinion it was the only way that she could make the impact she wished to make on people’s view of Africa.

She entered show business in Nigeria by taking on the role of Executive Producer and host of the television talk show called ‘Moments with Mo’. The show covers a cross-section of topics including lifestyle, health, culture, politics and entertainment. She has interacted with a wide spectrum of celebrities on the show, ranging from Presidents, Nobel laureates and the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. The show is aired on M-Net to 48 African countries.

Abudu came into contact with influential world figures through her talk show ‘Moments with Mo’.

Her reality show ‘The Debaters’ was instrumental in giving Africa a voice and a view.

Her debut film ‘Fifty’ was screened in the London Film Festival as Nigeria’s official entry.