Careers: Steve A. Adeshina: The Polymath Engineer Modernized Voting in Nigeria's Fledgling Democracy

In October 2000, when electrical engineer Steve A. Adeshina joined Nigeria's Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as director of information and communication technology, the country had just held its first successful democratic general elections in 17 years. The 1999 elections were generally peaceful, if not entirely reliable, according to independent observers. They were also technologically old-school: “When I arrived, things were done essentially manually,” Adeshina recalls, with some voters being registered by hand and others by typewriter.