Mentor someone and build a nation

Mentor

Someone & Build a Nation

“When you develop a mind, you contribute to the development of a people. Never fail to look around you and seek someone you can lift up and make better than yourself irrespective of gender, tribe, or religion, that is a better contribution to society than seeking to buy a private jet”.

~Prof. Adesoji Adesugba~

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THAT CHANCE MEETING CHANGED MY LIFE

Nothing gladdens my heart

as this opportunity to pencil down a few thoughts about a great friend and mentor, Professor Adesoji Adesugba at 60! A chance meeting in 2002 with Prof as he is fondly called in his office at the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) turned out to be one of the most momentous events of my life. Till date, the event of the July morning remains as clear as daylight to me and will forever be cherished in my memory as the beginning of my long-standing love and admiration for him. As an inexperienced young lawyer, fresh from Law School and having been unable to secure any form of formal employment after my youth service in 2000 decided to venture into the unchartered waters of self-employment to survive the rough terrain of the FCT.

I recall my unscheduled visit into the NIPC to make a pitch for my young law firm, Joint Heirs Chambers and I thought that the office of the Director Investment Promotion was a nice place to hit it off. I met with the then director, Alhaji Ghaji Bello, who directed me to make my inquiries from Prof, who at that time was an Assistant Director in the same department. Walking into his expansive office that day became my most strategic business meeting, as within fifteen minutes chat in a first-time meeting, without any prior referrals or recommendations, Prof told me that he would work with me. I am not sure what exactly I said to him to convince him. From that moment our friendship blossomed over the years. I see in him a principled leader, a teacher and a man of immense wisdom who has steadily guided my career as a lawyer.

vast experience and is a man that can be said to have seen a broad spectrum of things in his years of service, from working with the Nigerian Customs Service to retiring as the Chairman, Industrial Arbitration Panel, his broad spectrum of service in the public sector is only rivaled by that of his private sector entrepreneurship adventure to his experience as a scholar where he lectures in line with favorite past time which is, people building.

An avid reader, intellectually sagacious, a doting father, a most loyal friend, a human capacity development Champion, a thorough bred professional in the league of great thinkers, a man of uncommon insights and an ideas man with incredible work ethic, Prof commits himself to every assignment with the dexterity and tenacity of a bull. He exemplifies this in his transformational leadership qualities in his role as the Vice President in Charge of Information Communications Technology at the Abuja Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI), where he set up the training arm of the organization, the Business Entrepreneurship Skills Technology (Best Centre), which in less than one year has become the focal point of the Organisation.

His ambitious target of training over 1000 youth yearly under the #BEST1000, received much needed validation with the graduation

of its first 120 young graduates from the Centre. Prof has a deep understanding of the arcane rules of empowerment for self-reliance. As an innovative leader, he believes in the primacy of youth empowerment and building people and does not believe in holding a position to tackle any challenge but rather works silently from the background to deliver intangible results of building the next generation. Under his leadership as Provost, the BEST Centre has become the foremost private response to the burgeoning youth unemployment crisis that is befuddling the entire country.

Eze Anumnu, Chief Counsel, Joint Heirs Chambers, Abuja.

Prof comes from a background of

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Prof. Asedoji Adesugba and other dignitaries, with participants at the opening of the #BEST1000 Training Programme