He witnessed poverty while growing up
as a young man and saw poverty not as a curse but a stepping stone to where he
is today. With little or nothing he was able to go through the four walls of
the university and bagged different degrees in finance, accounting, economy,
tax and Banking and Finance. Now, having defeated poverty, Ken Ikechukwu Ojiri,
a technocrat, an entrepreneur and a man of all fields of life, have decided to
appreciate God for making him successful in life. To do that, he floated a
humanitarian organization to help the needy in Nigeria. The son of Ogwa- Ala,
in Owerri Local Government area and a graduate of Banking and Finance from the
Anambra State University of Technology, Awka Anambra State, is aspiring to
contest 2015 Imo State gubernatorial election under the Peoples Democratic
Party, PDP platform in this interview with, EMEKA
IBEMERE, said is time entrepreneurs take over the governance in Nigeria,
than leaving it in the hands of unschooled politicians.
What were the factors that motivated
you into philanthropy?
I’m driven
by the fact that I wouldn’t want people to go through what I went through in
life. I had a rough child-hood so to say. I wasn’t born with a silver-spoon in
my mouth or is it a golden spoon. I think I was born with a wooden spoon and
God having shown a favour to me, as a Christian, any opportunity I have to show
kindness to people, I won’t hesitate to do that. My becoming a philanthropist
is a way of giving God what he has giving to me and thanking Him in
appreciation for all he did for me. So I don’t want people to go through the
hardship that I went through while growing up, so it’s something driven by
passion to help and not because I want to go into politics. It has nothing to
do with my political ambition. Most of the things I do I wouldn’t want it to be
done in an open.
What have you been able to do for the
people of Imo State?
Well, I’m a
grassroots man. I have travelled far and wide but I live in the village and I
have contacts with the people of Imo State. I’m peoples’ person. I’m very close
to my people and I think being close to people would offer you that opportunity
to attain to their needs. I wouldn’t want a situation; I would be living in
towns and big hotels and distancing myself away from my people. I have a whole
lot of people in my scholarship scheme handled by my Foundation; Ken Ojiri
Foundation. Besides Ken Foundation programme, that cut across Imo State and
beyond Imo State, because recently, we had a programme in Ebonyi State, where
we released over 20 indigent patients held in different hospitals because of
their inability to pay their hospital bills but of course, you know that
philanthropy has no colour or borders.
At what point did you consider it
convenient to join politics
Well, I have
been around in politics since 2007, just as a member of Peoples Democratic
Party, PDP, but ever since I ever started looking deep into the process of
politics and governance in Nigeria, there certain loop-holes that we need to
fix and I also discovered that management of resources and because I have that
core competence in management or resources, I thought I could bring in my
experience to bare in the management of the state resources. I don’t see
anything different, whether you are in the state or you are managing a
multinational company, its all about managing resources for the benefit of all.
And that is what actually gingered my going into full time politics.
Any background in civil service
Well, I have
always worked for companies. I build my career in oil and gas and I have over
20 years of experience. I’m a chartered financial controller and I also run
consultancy services called Dan Consultancy, where I proffer solutions to
companies and on financial management and then provide tax consultancy services
for them. I work with a few revenue boards across Nigeria.
What is your own working plan for the
masses?
I have specific programmes I want to implement coupled with
the party’s vision and manifesto including the transformation agenda of the
President of the Federal Republic of Nigerian, President Goodluck Jonathan.
Considering the situation in which the state is, for example we have huge
unemployment problem in the state, and as a technocrat which I’m, I’m going
into politics to do serious governance, so such issues are the major issue I
want to address. The issue of unemployment is a serious issue in the state and
that is my first call to tackle because I have the core competence in building
businesses. I have worked for a lot of oil and gas companies and past of the
businesses I run is called start-up businesses, where multi-nationals come up
with small-scale business and getting people like us to run them and when it
becomes profitable they sell them off. So that is what we do and then I take
the retainer-ship. Most of the consultancies I run are the companies that I was
part of from the initial stages of building up the companies, and then when we
sell them off, I maintain the retainer-ship.
With this kind of business idea don’t
you think you are going to commercialise governance.
No, no, it’s
not about commercialisation of governance. Governance is about purpose driven,
governance is not what played out. Governance is a serious business. Governance
should be profit orientated. Governance should be enabling private sector to
kick-start the growth that would create employments. Just what will create
enabling enviroment that allows growth of the economy of the state and that is
what I want to do in Imo State?
How are you mobilizing the masses of Imo State?
We are doing
quite some work that is appealing to the grassroots so to say. We are doing
great works reaching out to people, especially the grassroots. We have quite
number of projects and you should understand that I’m the sole sponsor of a
huge grassroots organization called Re-build
Nigeria Initiative. We have that as platform and I also have bankrolled
Progressives Friends Foundation called PFF, I’m also the state sponsor and we
have an alliance with some other institutions, like the Niger-Delta Youth
Movement, we have over 10 youth movements and these are all grassroots
organisations that we are working with. The grassroots issue is not a problem.
What is your relationship with the grassroots?
We have the
intention of reaching out to them in our consultation stage. We have contacted
the PDP party structure in the zones, we have also met quite some handful of
stakeholders, leaders of the state, and we have seen service support
organizations, which are also part of the grassroots, like the National
Association of Nigerian Traders, (NANTS), we have also seen National
Association of Nigerian Students, NANS, we have also met with the Tricycle
Organisation members, we have all seen majority of them. We are just waiting to
strike a chord to take the state.
What are you seeing now that if you
happen to get the ticket of your party and goes ahead to win the governorship
election of Imo State, you will do differently?
I would say
for the past eight years now, the things that are being done in the state are
kind of window dressing. There is no real infrastructure for growth and there
is nothing on ground to create that growth that would create employment
opportunities for the teeming unemployed graduates in the state. We need to set
the foundation right now, the foundation is not right; the enviroment is not
enabling and conducive. For you to have enabling business enviroment we need to
put structures in place and growth doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Growth is a
process, we have in our programme for the state, a plan to leverage on the agriculture and you
believe with me that a lot of employment are created from agricultural sector
and we want to maximize the advantages that we have in that sector. We have
enough land in the state, we have enough human resources, and we have skilled
manpower, we could work on those array and empty lands, all we need do is to
make sure that we provided the tools that are necessary to achieve the desired
goals of our agricultural vision that would move us forward. We are also
looking at the health sector, it’s quite an interesting sector and too many
things come out of this sector. And we want to reverse the trend in medical
tourism to have five-star hospitals in the state. for example, I have been
opportune to be in Europe, I went there in 1993 and I spent close to 24 years,
and ever since I returned, I have close contact with my businesses in Europe I
have my business in Netherlands, UK and US, so I’m in a better position to tell
you how it works there. So, we want those technologies there to this place. It
is not what we are going to read from the books, it is what we have
experienced.
Imo state needs industry and we don’t
know how it would be industrialized.
That is what
we are saying. The private sector needs to come in; our government must be
private sector initiative and we intend to encourage the private sector to come
up. They create more businesses more than the public sector. And then there are
lots of avenue to do that; one is creating an enabling enviroment, making sure
that they have access to loan, making sure they grow. We can go into this
private partnership, PPP, in setting certain infrastructure by going from
unknown to known that is why I emphasise on being leverage from the agriculture.
This is what we have and we can from that, see that every other economy grew
from agriculture which provides the raw materials for the industries to take
off. When you all these, the private industries including medium and small
scale ones would just spring up naturally.
The incumbency factors in Nigeria
politics, and in case you picked the PDP ticket, are you prepared for it.
One good
thing about incumbency thing is that incumbent is not running on the same
platform with me. So, I don’t have any phobia. I don’t like speaking on
incumbency but there are lots and lots of destabilizations in the polity.
People are yearning for a change. It would be a smooth sail but with a
caveat-there is likelihood that PDP will take the day but the caveat there is going
to be on the selection of the PDP candidate. This is the issue. If they select
a good candidate, running down the APC candidate in Imo State, is not an issue.
It’s a very and very simple and it’s going to be a smooth sail for PDP.
How far are you doing with the other
local governments in the state?
We have
representatives in all the local government areas of the state and we called
them LGA coordinators. We have met all the structures within the local
government Areas in the State, we have seen the ward Chairmen, we have visited
the LGA Chairmen of the parties and at the senatorial levels, and we have also
done something in that level. We have gone to Okigwe and Orlu and we are to see
Owerri and of course our visitation is not limited to the areas alone.
Sometimes, we see the leaders individually and some other times we see them in
group and address them.
Let’s look at the zoning formular in
Imo State politics, its becoming a serious issue of debate, we don’t know
whether your party has altered that formular and if your zone is denied
presenting a candidate in PDP, what will be your take.
No, I
wouldn’t get annoyed with that but I think the party at the national level is
very savvy and understand the system very well and they also know that one way
on the other, zoning is enshrined in the constitution, I wouldn’t want to go
into the relevance sections because it is contentious issue may be because some
people think that they can confuse the others, to remain to power but the truth
of the matter is that Orlu has done their own beat, Okigwe Zone have done
theirs, too. Then its now the turn of Owerri zone, it’s a simple truth and it
is not disputable unless it’s on selfish interest.
One thing that we don’t like in
candidates is on the issue of one pretending to be serious during consultations
and declaration of ambitions but turns back to step down late in the night for
another candidate; are you that type of candidate. And what if it reaches to
the extent of PDP asking Owerri candidates in PDP to reach at consensus and it
didn’t favour you.
I speak for
myself and for me as a person, there is no going back in this race and there is
amount of money that can be given to me to step down, it is not about me it’s
about people of Imo State queuing behind me. Its about people yearning for
change, it’s about people trying to change an ugly situation, so I cannot
afford to betray them.
What would you want the people to do
as the primaries are closer?
Let me tell
you in the past dispensations, they don’t have alternative. The only choice
they have are the ones that have turn their fortunes to misfortunes, I’m the
alternative and there are a lots of professionals coming into politics now, and
its a good development but the people must be very careful of the choice they
make. They should be careful of the people they have send either to the
National Assemblies, State House, State House of Assembly, that cannot be able
to give account of their stewardship but are looking forward to a re-election
or new positions, they should be very and very careful of the choice they are
going to make.
They also
need to select someone who should be able to take them away from the mess we
are in now there is no government in Imo State, the government is not running
and everyone knows that the present government is run like a private business
because it’s not an all inclusive government. Imo people should inwards for a
candidate that doesn’t belong to the old school of thought. They should look for
somebody they know that is adaptive to change; somebody who can easily embrace
new ideas. A candidate who has all it takes to pull them out of servitude and
slavery they are in now, a man who is pure technocrat and an entrepreneur as a
leader.
What is your motto?
I believe in
using certain assets virtues bestow in me to serve humanity, using certain
natural endowments to serve humanity.
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