Caretaker-Turned-Successor: Gokada’s New CEO Has To Do The Improbable

When Nikhil Goel first arrived in Nigeria to serve as Vice-President of Rides at Gokada in January 2020, he basically crashed at the late Fahim Saleh’s place during the first few months.

Although the duo had struck up a conversation going back several months, they didn’t meet in-person until September 2019. At the time, Goel was with SafeBoda Kenya having previously worked at the India-based food delivery startup unicorn, Zomato. On his part, Saleh was attempting to reposition Gokada to claim turf in the bike-hailing race that was heating up in Lagos at the time.

A few conversations happened and Goel was sold on Saleh’s vision for Gokada, and before long, he was catching a flight to Lagos to help build that vision, together. But that “together” part was not to be. The news of Saleh’s untimely demise in July 2020 changed everything.