A counselling practitioner, Tosin Togun, has said that strengthening professional counselling practice is critical to Nigeria’s national development, stressing the need for ethical standards, structured processes, and evidence-based approaches in service delivery.
Togun, Lead Consultant at Sure Hope Counselling Centre, Ibadan, spoke while delivering a paper at the 2026 Annual Conference and Award Ceremony of the Counselling Association of Nigeria (CASSON), Oyo State Chapter, held at The Polytechnic, Ibadan.
The conference, themed “Raising the Bar: Exploring Current Trends in Counselling Profession and National Development,” brought together stakeholders to examine the role of counselling in addressing Nigeria’s growing mental health and social challenges.
Speaking on how to improve counselling practice, she identified ethics, counselling theories, and client administration processes as the three core pillars required for effective service delivery.
“The summary of today’s presentation is on how well to deliver counselling services,” she said.
“Without counselling ethics, counselling theories, and proper client administration processes in place, the counsellor might not be able to deliver properly.”
Explaining further, Togun described counselling ethics as the code of conduct guiding practitioners, highlighting autonomy as a key principle.
“It is important that you allow your clients to hold the sessions to a good extent. You don’t impose counselling services on your clients,” she said.
On counselling skills, she emphasised curiosity as fundamental to successful practice.
“As a counsellor, it is important that you are curious because that sets the background for the success of your practice. You need a lot of information to diagnose your clients properly, and without being curious, you might not be able to get those necessary information,” she added.
Togun also highlighted the importance of structured client management, noting that the process of admitting and understanding clients determines the outcome of therapy.
“How well you are able to admit your clients determines the success of your practice. The client administration process sets the tone for how successful a counselling procedure will be,” she said.
She explained that effective client management involves information gathering, personality testing, and case classification.
Addressing the relationship between faith and counselling, Togun maintained that while religion plays a role in mental wellness, it cannot replace professional therapy.
“In mental health practice, you don’t take away the client’s faith. Knowing there is a supreme being helps to a level on the ladder of mental wellness,” she said.
“However, a counsellor uses structured discussion based on counselling theories and techniques, not just advice or experiences. When we rely so much on religiosity, we might not be able to take our clients to total wellness. We still need the combination of therapy and faith to bring them to 100 per cent wellness.”
Earlier in her address, the Oyo State Chairperson of CASSON, Dr Oluwatoyin Ajiboye, said counselling is a broad profession that extends beyond teaching and can serve as a viable means of livelihood.
“Counselling is more than teaching. Counselling is everything. There is no area that you don’t need a counsellor,” she said.
Ajiboye noted that many Nigerians still underestimate the profession, adding that trained counsellors can establish independent practices and contribute to society.
“As a counsellor, you can stand on your own. You can establish your own counselling clinic where people will come and you will be charging money. You can take care of yourself and your family,” she said.
She also raised concerns over the increasing number of unqualified individuals presenting themselves as counsellors.
“The majority of people that are calling themselves counsellors are not counsellors because they are not professionals,” she warned.
