Nigeria’s former health minister and the Executive Director of the United Nations Populations Fund, UNFPA, Prof. Babatunde Osotimehin, has passed on. He was said to have died in his home in New York hours after returning from church on Sunday.

A transition message issued by the family and signed by Dr. Babajide Osotimehin did not disclose cause of death but the professor of medicine may have died of heart attack as he did not present with any ailment at the time of his demise.

The UN Under-Secretary-General and former head of Nigeria’s National Agency for the Control of Aids, NACA, was said to have died in the early hours of Monday (Nigerian time) but Sunday evening in New York..

Born February 6, 1949, the 68-year-old at a time served as Provost of the College of Medicine at the University of Ibadan.

Osotimehin was appointed the fourth Executive Director of UNFPA in November 2010 and was reappointed in August 2014.

While working in Nigeria as head of NACA, he created a buzz of awareness around HIV/AIDS through strident media advocacy.