80 Toasts to the people’s general, By Iboro Otongaran

Etiebet is certainly a basic main the best way for his folks in lots of theatres of their battle. His management doesn’t present by way of solely in interpersonal relationships and in enterprise. It has been significantly demonstrated in politics. Etiebet’s footprints are unmistakable in each political epoch and in each main political motion within the nation within the final 30 years.

All too usually conventional titles are thrown round as confetti to scratch egoistic itch. The title for Atuekong Donald Obot Etiebet, a pre-eminent geoscientist and IT geek, got here from a special type of consideration. His chieftaincy title, Atuekong, which interprets actually as the top of the folks’s military, speaks to his superb persona on the life stage, his preventing spirit for the liberation of his folks from all method of shackles, and the untameable starvation in his stomach to make a distinction wherever he’s.

For these and extra causes I’m at one with the Petroleum Membership and all folks of goodwill in celebrating the folks’s basic, the Atuekong of Akwa Abasi Ibom State, a dream-maker, an epitome of excellence and a person of imaginative and prescient, as he marks three rating years and ten plus ten on earth. A person whose coronary heart beats with a lot goodness, Etiebet has in the middle of his illustrious profession reached out and lifted numerous properties and households with jobs and mentoring for his or her breadwinners, laying out an enormous private fortune — by way of endowments, scholarships, prizes, donations and sponsorships — for the advantage of many throughout the nation. A private fortune he constructed by dint of laborious work by way of a enterprise empire stretching throughout actual property, oil and fuel, banking, training, in addition to info and communication expertise (ICT).

For years, his IT firm, Knowledge Sciences, was an incubator for abilities acquisition and management coaching. So many individuals in management positions right now in Akwa Ibom State and throughout the nation learnt at Etiebet’s ft in Knowledge Sciences. Etiebet’s optimistic impression has graced my household — so I ought to know — simply as he has impacted many different households across the nation. There are, due to this fact, compelling private causes for a number of grateful of us to rejoice with him on this very completely happy event of his birthday. We rejoice and thank God that we’ve got him as a blessing at a private degree, and much more in order an even bigger blessing for the nation.

For the nation, Etiebet affords a luminous profile in exemplary management. This isn’t to be taken evenly. The query of management on the planet’s most populous black nation, Nigeria, is simply so elemental that it deserves each shred of curiosity. I agree wholly with Chinua Achebe that the difficulty with Nigeria is the issue of management. So, when a person like Atuekong Etiebet comes together with a sterling non-public sector file as a enterprise chief, and serves within the public sector as Petroleum Minister creditably, not singed by the sludge of sleaze, then we merely have an ideal case examine in fascinating and efficient management.

For the nation, Etiebet’s excellent achievements are many. He it was who cracked the conundrum that held again the consummation of the Nigerian Liquefied Pure Fuel (NLNG) challenge by nudging the Federal Authorities away from hankering after holding the controlling shares within the funding, a coverage stance that had confirmed to be the stumbling block to the realisation of the challenge for years. By his commonsense management and energy of imaginative and prescient, the nation constructed the NLNG, which is right now a bellwether for the nationwide treasury. It was additionally throughout his tenure as Petroleum Minister that the Petroleum Belief Fund was established as a significant interventionist company to deal with critical infrastructure and human capital deficits in lots of sectors of the society, significantly in tertiary training.

As Minister, Etiebet oversaw the roll-out of a spread of different farsighted reforms within the petroleum sector which have since served because the defining options of the trade. They embody deep offshore exploration and drilling — a slice of the sector that also retains the curiosity of relocating oil majors; introduction of the nation’s first occasion of monetisation coverage within the Nigerian Nationwide Petroleum Company (NNPC); and the streamlining of operational processes within the then Division of Petroleum Assets, to tame its unwieldy forms and optimise productiveness and effectivity in that important division within the Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Assets on the time. He equally promoted the coverage of native content material to cultivate the oil and fuel trade and combine it with the native financial system. The native content material coverage would later crystallise within the institution of the Nigerian Content material Improvement and Monitoring Board in 2010 in the course of the Obasanjo presidency, a fruits of a coverage articulation that has been a shot within the arm for native gamers within the oil and fuel trade.

Etiebet’s management impression just isn’t restricted to his pathfinding work within the non-public sector, neither is it to his transformational coverage initiatives and execution in authorities on the federal degree. On the state degree in Akwa Ibom and on the regional stage within the Niger Delta, Etiebet lived as much as his stripes as Atuekong when he joined forces together with his compatriots who embody however are usually not restricted to His Excellency Obong Victor Attah, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, Obong Umana Okon Umana, Senator Effiong Bob, Senator James Akpanudoedehe, Senator Aloysius Etok, Senator Ita Enang and different champions of fairness within the nation to combat and win the useful resource management battle.

The useful resource management victory in opposition to a most vicious asphyxiation of a area of the nation has offered a supply of much-needed growth and sustenance for the Niger Delta — although there seems to be a consensus that despite the victorious battle in opposition to the plot of entrenched pursuits to disclaim the area the advantages on account of it from its pure sources, the actual struggle for the frequent possession and equitable enjoyment of these sources delivered by way of the 13 per cent derivation funds remains to be raging.

Etiebet is certainly a basic main the best way for his folks in lots of theatres of their battle. His management doesn’t present by way of solely in interpersonal relationships and in enterprise. It has been significantly demonstrated in politics. Etiebet’s footprints are unmistakable in each political epoch and in each main political motion within the nation within the final 30 years. Through the efforts to disengage from navy rule, Etiebet shaped and funded the Nationwide Centre Occasion of Nigeria (NCPN) as a platform with which to rally like minds and steer a centrist path on a political rescue mission. However because it’s well-known the uncertainties and duplicity of these occasions assured that the NCPN confronted no destiny totally different from what befell all political efforts of that interval.

In 1997 or thereabouts, there was one other political sunshine second on the tortuous street to freedom from an extended and sporting navy rule. Once more, Etiebet huddled up with others to type the Peoples Democratic Occasion (PDP) that went on to win the 1999 basic elections and shaped the central authorities led by President Olusegun Obasanjo. The PDP additionally received the native election in his native state of Akwa Ibom. Etiebet was simply acknowledged because the kingmaker of that authorities, which took over from the navy within the state. But it surely’s an open secret that he was not accorded a godfather’s due. The uneasy relationship would solely worsen till a rupture occurred throughout the federal government that succeeded the inaugural 1999 democratic administration within the state. Etiebet then joined the All Progressives Congress (APC) the place he has functioned since as an elder statesman.

As I write this tribute, I’m nursing a priority. It’s a priority that has loved resonance amongst Nigerians late and dwelling. I bear in mind the late Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu honouring the late Obafemi Awolowo in his condolence register with the epitaph, “The perfect president Nigeria by no means had.” Ojukwu was right here lamenting the street not taken, certainly the street not seen. It’s an announcement that completes the Nigerian paradox when taken along with Achebe’s uncontested argument that the issue with Nigeria is an issue of management. So, right here you’ve gotten a scenario the place Ojukwu says, hey, this can be a uncommon gem that might have completely met our management want. Etiebet and others like him abound, excellent samplers in management suits that the nation is in dire want of, but we agonise over the shortage of excellent management within the nation.

Why is it that we don’t see, throughout management recruitment cycles, what we’ve got in one of the best of management potential round us? To make certain, Etiebet has had good alternatives to serve his folks and the nation, and has discharged his commissions creditably. However as I’d ask concerning all different beautiful circumstances of one of the best Nigeria has on supply, have we made one of the best use of our ablest women and men? It’s time we started to have a special type of dialog about management recruitment in Nigeria.

I’m sorry, I assume I digressed. This isn’t the day for gripes. It’s a second to fill our glasses and be part of the toast to an important man, an excellent mental, a person with eagle focus and of manifest achievements.

Glad birthday, Sir, and plenty of joyous returns of the day!

Iboro Otongaran is the chief govt officer at ProData Restricted in Lagos.