Axipro is growing, and so are the people driving it. We’re announcing two leadership moves that reflect where the firm is heading: the promotion of Abeera Zainab to GRC Lead, and the appointment of Ikponke Godwin, CISM, as Principal Advisor.
Both appointments are effective immediately.
Abeera Zainab: GRC Lead
Abeera joined Axipro in early 2024 and has been at the centre of the firm’s delivery ever since. Over the past two years, she has led compliance engagements across ISO 27001, SOC 2, GDPR, PCI DSS, HIPAA, and ISO 42001, and has been a key reason why Axipro has maintained a 100% audit success rate across more than 40 certified clients.
What makes Abeera effective is not just technical depth, though she has that: she holds the ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Lead Auditor certification (CQI/IRCA), the ISO/IEC 42001:2023 Lead Auditor certification, and the Drata Fundamentals Certification. It’s also the way she works. Clients consistently describe engagements she leads as structured, transparent, and notably calm even when timelines are tight or scopes expand mid-project.
As GRC Lead, Abeera takes ownership of Axipro’s compliance practice, including delivery quality, team development, and the continued evolution of Axipro’s advisory methodology.
Ikponke Godwin: Principal Advisor
Ikponke brings something that is genuinely difficult to find: deep technical security experience and mature governance expertise, developed at the same time rather than in sequence.
As Principal Advisor, Ikponke will work with enterprise and mid-market clients on complex compliance engagements, technical security assessments, and GRC transformation programmes.
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These are not just two strong hires and promotions. They reflect the kind of firm Axipro is becoming: one where practitioners with real credentials and real client experience lead the work, not just manage it.
She comes from EY, where she served as Senior Cybersecurity Consultant for West Africa. Before that, nearly two years at PwC Nigeria as both Associate Cybersecurity Specialist and Penetration Tester, and a secondment at Flutterwave as GRC Analyst, where she led NIST CSF 2.0 gap assessments, built out risk taxonomies, and used Drata to automate compliance workflows across one of Africa’s most closely-watched fintech platforms.
She holds the CISM designation and brings hands-on experience across vulnerability assessment, SIEM operations, third-party risk, and security policy development. Her instinct is practical: she has noted publicly that the best security controls are the ones people actually use, and that complexity is often the real risk.
As Principal Advisor, Ikponke will work with enterprise and mid-market clients on complex compliance engagements, technical security assessments, and GRC transformation programmes.
These are not just two strong hires and promotions. They reflect the kind of firm Axipro is becoming: one where practitioners with real credentials and real client experience lead the work, not just manage it.
More to come.
