Alabi was born on 1 March 1958. He is a Christian and married to Prof. Goski B. Alabi. They have two children.
Alabi completed his professional training in Accountancy and Marketing at the then Institute of Professional Studies (IPS) from 1976 to 1980. He later went to Europe for two Masters Degrees; one in Industrial Economics (MSc) from the Moscow Institute of National Economy, Plekhanov (now Russian Economics University) in 1986 and an MSc in International Marketing from Strathclyde University in Glasgow Scotland where he awarded the Mushod Abiola Prize for Excellence in Marketing in 1992.
After completing his professional training at the IPS, Alabi took up a teaching appointment at the Northern School of Business in Tamale from 1980 to 1981 before leaving for the Soviet Union to pursue his academic degrees.
While a student in Europe, Alabi was the Ambassador for Ghanaian students, holding the positions of NUGS President Europe from 1985 to 1986, NUGS President USSR for two terms, from 1983 to 1985, and NUGS Moscow Vice-President from 1982 to 1983. As NUGS, President, Alabi led “The Medicines for Health Project” and in 1984 he mobilized and delivered a volume of medicines to then Head of State, Flt. Lt. Jerry John Rawlings for the people of Ghana during the heightened period of the recession in the early 1980s.
Prior to his appointment as Vice-Chancellor, Alabi spent over twenty years of his life as a Lecturer from 1987 to 2005. During the period he became the Head of the Marketing Department in 1989, to the Dean of the Management Faculty from 2003 to 2005. He was promoted to the rank of Senior Lecturer by the University in 2001, and Associate Professor in 2008 by the University's Governing Council, after meeting the criteria for promotions set by the University's Appointments and Promotions Board. He got promoted to the position of Pro-Rector from 2005 to 2008, and to Rector from 2008 to 2012.
In the field of Sports, Alabi was the General Secretary for the Ghana League Clubs Association (GHALCA) from 1994 to 1997. He was also a Member of the Ghana Football Association’s Management Board (GFA) and Coordinator of the Ghana Black Stars Management Committee from 1994 to 1997.
He was appointed by the then President of the Republic of Ghana, His Excellency Flt. Lt. Jerry John Rawlings as the Minister of State for the Greater Accra and Northern Regions respectively from 1997 to 2001. He presided over the Regional Security Councils for the Greater Accra and Northern Regions respectively as Chairman from 1997 to 2001.
When the NDC lost the 2000 elections, Alabi was appointed as the Chairman for the Greater Accra Regional Reorganization Committee. Soon after, he got elected as the Greater Accra Regional Chairman of the NDC from 2001 to 2005. He also became the Campaign Coordinator for the Prof. John Atta Mills campaign in 2004.
Alabi has also participated in a number of international workshops and peer reviewed conferences and presented papers at some of these conferences with his paper on the “Effects of ethnicity in Political Marketing in Ghana” winning the Best Conference Paper Awards judged by peers at the 2007 Clute Institute Academic Research Conference in Las –Vegas, USA.
Alabi was a Member of the Group of Experts of the Executive Board of UNESCO (Paris) in 2011, a Member of the Executive Committee and chaired the West Africa Region of the International Association of University Presidents from 2011 to 2016.
He was also named as the Africa Vice-Chancellor of the Year 2013 by the All-Africa Students Union. Additionally, Alabi was awarded by the National Union of Ghana Students, (NUGS) for his contribution to education in Ghana.
On 29 October 2016, The President of the Republic of Ghana, His Excellency John Dramani Mahama awarded Alabi the “Officer of the Order of the Volta” honour.
He was also named Ghana’s Most Influential Public Sector Leader for the year 2012, by IMANI Ghana, a policy Think Tank, for his quiet, sturdy and inspirational leadership, resulting in the transformation of the then IPS.
