Hon. Justice Kanyip was appointed a Judge of the National Industrial Court in 2000 for an initial period of four years. In June 2004, having completed the first term, his appointment for another term was renewed, and he is now a tenured Judge of the Court.

Professor Kanyip attended Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria for his LLB, and the Nigerian Law School, Lagos for his BL. After the mandatory one-year national service, he took up a teaching appointment as a Lecturer at ABU Zaria in 1987 and rose to the position of Lecturer II before leaving in 1992.

In 1995, he was appointed Senior Research Fellow at the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies and rose to the rank of Associate Research Professor of Law in 2000 when he joined the Court.

Professor Kanyip is the author of Consumer Protection in Nigeria: Law, Theory and Policy (2005) and a joint author of Elements of Commercial Law (1994). He has done consultancies for ECOWAS, the ILO, and the Federal Government of Nigeria on labour-related matters. He became the substantive President, National Industrial Court of Nigeria on 13th December 2019.