13th November, 2013
By Bart Nnaji
Sustained stable political climate is largely fostered by the politicians especially the political parties. Secure environment and rule of law and sound economic policy are provided by visionary and purposeful governments. Nigeria has been witnessing in recent times tremendous insecurity. We have gone from Niger-Delta militancy to kidnapping for ransom to Boko Haram. Investors always look for secure environments to host them. Some of the techniques employed by those perpetrating the insecurity are totally alien to our culture and hence government has had to grapple with finding solutions. The insecurity situation certainly impacts on your ability to get jobs and where you can get them.
A critical part of our success in our building a growing economy is rule of law. A country that has a weak judicial system cannot develop a strong economy. Investors are usually afraid that their investment will not be protected by such a system. In those countries, ‘‘cash and carry’’ justice normally prevails to the detriment of law and order.
A major element of rule of law is respect for contracts signed by the government. Where the government easily tramples on contracts entered into by itself, investors normally lose confidence in the Government to uphold its side of any bargain. This is an area of serious worry by those of us who have pitched our tent to invest in our beloved country Nigeria. Infrastructure is very expensive and anyone investing must feel that they can recover their costs. Most investments in infrastructure is usually based on some form of agreement with the government. Breaching such agreement means destroying the economic plan of the investor. People will begin to run away from such a country.
Infrastructure is the fundamental enabler that provides the level playing field where the capable compete. Some infrastructure can be provided by the government. For example, roads, railway networks, pipelines, transmission lines, etc. some can be provided by the private sector. Example is power. Even those that are supposed to be provided by the government can actually be provided by the private sector with government support. This support does not have to be cash. It can be in the form of guarantees and concessions. The government just has to be creative and be willing to empower its private sector to take the lead.
The idea of concession is particularly effective. My company Geometric Power was awarded a concession of the Aba metropolis in 2005. The idea is that Government will enable a competent company to take responsibility for providing a very important service in this case electricity. The company will be guided by regulation of the Government regulator; but Government will not have to spend money to support the service provision anymore.
The Aba IPP is an example of how the private sector can significantly impact society. In recognizing that Nigerians and industries in particular need absolute reliable electricity, our company, Geometric Power went on to find a solution that will address this challenge. It created a model where it leases the electricity distribution network assets from the Federal Government; invests and improves the distribution assets, builds a power plant to generate more electricity than the load demand in Aba, builds a pipeline to pipe reliable gas to the plant, etc.
A country like Japan is not endowed with so much natural resources, but it built its first rate economy on the highest quality human capital. As University graduates you should be superbly articulate and engaging in addition to your specialization. You are expected to have good working knowledge of computers regardless of your major. This is how we can plan for the type of human capital that will support our economy of the future. You are the ones that society must depend on envisioning planning and implementing how our economy will progress when you step out of this campus. You must join with others like you who have gone through a refined minting process to be honed in the skills of creating value just your brains.
A major ingredient to our success as a nation and your success as an individual is the quality of education you have acquired from this fine institution and your dedication to applying this quality in your future endeavours.
The final source of new ideas is the people. But they have to be educated citizens; the ones who know that a particular idea fills a void that does not exist in the market, the global market. And that is where education becomes the paramount consideration and where the teachers and particularly the lectures hold the destiny of our people. As academics, we must answer these questions: what do we allow our students to walk away with from our institutions? Can they pass the scrutiny of a refined mind both in character and in learning? What quantum of knowledge do they possess? Have they been trained to translate the knowledge which they have into something tangible that would benefit the society? Have they been shown the way of turning their knowledge into wealth creation?
Finally, when our students graduate from the universities, they normally look for jobs. Only very few think of creating employment for themselves and others. Entrepreneurship is a major enabler for economic expansion in the developed and emerging worlds. We have not been quite successful in Nigerian in stimulating young minds to engage themselves in self-motivated initiatives which can lead to sustaining their livelihood and potentially, others. It is my belief that high quality education especially in any professional endeavour can lead to entrepreneurship, be it in Accountancy, Medicine, Law, Engineering, the Arts etc. in the field of technology, we all know the story of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, the Yahoo Founders: Jerry Yang and David Filo; as well as the Facebook investors Mark Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovitz, Eduardo Severin, and Chris Hughes. All became stupendously wealthy as young students or graduates like yourself, determined to solve a problem and in the world. They were courageous. They believed in themselves. I believe that many of you have similar characteristics but may not have come to an understanding that you can do the same. I challenge you to think about this.
Charge to graduating students:
Go out there and be a shining example of what Nigeria and Africa can give to the world. Become part of a movement that will drop Nigeria from the list of the most corrupt nations in the world. Be a game changer. Change your world as President Obama did in an industrial economy. Give something of yourself to society without expecting much in return. Refuse to be a mediocre. Become an asset rather than a liability.
•This thought-provoking Convocation Lecture was recently delivered at Bells University of Technology, Ota, Ogun state, by Prof. Bart O. Nnaji, the Chairman/CEO of Geometric Power Limited.