Nigerian public-health expert leads HIV response in South Africa under USAID initiative

A Nigerian-trained physician and public-health expert is playing a pivotal role in Africa’s response to HIV/AIDS.

Dr Augustine Onyeka Okoli currently serves as Deputy Director for the University Research Co., LLC (URC) under the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) ASSIST project, where he leads coordination of HIV programmes across South Africa.

His appointment signals not just technical leadership but a pan-African shift in public-health systems at a time of heightened urgency.

The ASSIST project is part of USAID’s efforts to support the South African Department of Health (DOH) in delivering high-quality HIV prevention, treatment, and care services, aligned with the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and other multilateral partnerships.

Dr. Okoli’s role places him at the critical juncture between the national government, donor-funded technical teams, local NGOs, and community-based service providers. South Africa remains at the epicentre of the global HIV epidemic, with an estimated 7.8 million people living with the virus as of 2024.

The scale and complexity of the health-system challenges—workforce shortages, infrastructure constraints, patient retention issues—are vast, and the ASSIST project’s mission is to institutionalise quality-improvement methods to strengthen long-term service delivery and sustainability.

Dr Okoli explains: “We are working not only to boost the numbers of people tested and treated, but to embed systems that ensure sustained, high-quality care across provinces.”

In his capacity, he designs frameworks that align project interventions to national HIV priorities and tailors them to provincial contexts, working closely with DOH directorates.

A key part of his portfolio involves training and capacity-building across the ASSIST project. He heads the training needs analysis, identifies skill gaps among facility teams, and develops customized training programs, manuals, and job aids consistent with national protocols and URC’s quality improvement methodologies.

Under his guidance, the project has implemented a tiered approach that encompasses classroom instruction, on-site coaching, and performance evaluations, a model designed to foster improvement not only at individual facilities but also across districts and provinces.

“Continuous improvement is more than a catch-phrase, it’s a culture we are embedding,” Dr Okoli says. He also oversees monitoring and evaluation (M&E) efforts: ensuring performance indicators align with PEPFAR and DOH reporting frameworks, tracking data on HIV testing uptake, treatment initiation, viral-load suppression, adherence support, and links between HIV, TB and maternal-child health services.

By deploying real-time dashboards and conducting performance reviews, Dr Okoli and his teams pinpoint bottlenecks and guide targeted quality-improvement initiatives in under-performing areas.

His leadership also emphasises multi-sector collaboration across government departments, donor organisations and community-based providers.

These joint planning forums help reduce duplication of effort, optimise scarce human and financial resources, and align service-delivery models.

As he puts it: “When government, donors and communities plan together, we build shared ownership—and that makes all the difference.”

Before his current assignment in South Africa, Dr. Okoli held leadership roles in Nigeria, Kenya, and Uganda, working on health system strengthening, capacity building, and HIV program implementation.

He holds a medical degree from the University of Nigeria and a postgraduate qualification in public-health management from the University of Cape Town.

His cross-border experience allows him to navigate the operational complexities common to resource-limited settings across sub-Saharan Africa.

As the ASSIST project enters its final implementation phase, Dr Okoli’s focus is firmly on sustainability: ensuring that the gains made during the project’s lifetime are maintained through institutional ownership, local capacity, and integration with broader government reforms in primary healthcare.

With South Africa’s health sector under pressure to expand coverage while improving quality, the leadership of pan-African professionals, such as Dr. Okoli, remains vital.

His work exemplifies a shift away from externally led programs to locally anchored leadership that builds Africa’s capability to deliver on its own public health challenges.

In the evolving landscape of HIV/AIDS on the continent, one message stands out: strengthening systems and building local capacity matter as much as medicines and diagnostics.

Dr. Okoli’s role in South Africa is a demonstration of that principle in action—and a sign of Africa shaping its own public health future.