By Enyi
Ejike-Umunnabuike and Maryam Nwachukwu
Dr Akinwumi Ayode
Adesina, the current President and Chairman of Council of the
20-member Board of the African Development Bank { AfDB } is an urbane man
of all seasons. He is an intellectually over -achieving
personality, with a high affinity for creativity , uncommon
value-addition , skilled corporate governance competences ,
rounded-knowledge base , experience , brilliance and intelligence.
Before 2015, he was Nigeria’s
Honourable Minister of Agriculture & Rural Development.
Duing his period of development
administrative stewardship, under the President Goodlluck Ebele Jonathan
, Federal administration, Dr. Akinwumi Ayodeji Adesina, left a highly
enthralling scorecard as a political appointee of government , who
was able the manage the positive gains of the electoral successes of that
administration, achieving lots of feats , amidst very compelling and
challenging circumstances.
Perhaps, the successes and
lasting impressions that he left behind as Nigeria's Honourable
Minister of Agriculture & Rural Development, provided a very
unbiased career-premised evaluative template that found him worthy of
selection and eventual endorsement as the most competent of all the
candidates that vied for the exalted position.
This well cultured , disciplined and
humble balanced personality , listed , known addressed and called Dr.
Akinwumi Ayodeji Adesina , will by March 6th,2024, be
honoured the OBAFEMI AWOLOWO FOUNDATION at the Lagos
Continental Hotel with the prestigious Obafemi Awolowo Prize for Leadership .
The President of the African Development
Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwumi Ayodeji Adesina, will be formally honoured and
presented with the distinguished Obafemi Awolowo Prize for Leadership
2023.
As a tie-back to history, it will be
recalled that the Obafemi Awolowo Prize for Leadership, was first
announced in December 2012, with the official award ceremony held on March 6,
2013.
Before Dr Akinwumi Ayodeji
Adesina ,was announced as its fourth recipient, three other distinguished
personalities had been conferred with the same award .
These include the, Noble Laureate,
Prof. Wole Soyinka; former South African President, Dr. Thabo Mbeki; and the
founder of the Afe Babalola University, Aare Afe Babalola, respectively.
A very significant aspect of this
event is that it also coincides with the birth anniversary of the late foremost
nationalist and statesman in whose memory the award was instituted.
The award is an initiative of the
Obafemi Awolowo Foundation, set up in April 1992 to serve as the custodian of
Chief Awolowo’s intellectual property and leadership legacy values and norms.
Established as an independent, non-profit, non-partisan organisation dedicated
to immortalizing the democratic and development-oriented ideals of Chief
Obafemi Awolowo, the organizers of the event, say the award is a “prestigious,
biennial, international prize structured to follow a rigorous process of
nomination and subsequent screening by a Selection Committee consisting of some
of the most outstanding Nigerians”.
They further said that the prize
serves as a strong motivational incentive for persons to pursue excellence in
leadership and good governance. The award, confers considerable honour and
recognition to the recipient.
Speaking on the selection process
which led to the choice of Adesina as the 2023 recipient, the foundation
Spokesperson Dr. Mrs. Tokumbo Awolowo - Dosunmu , said the call for nomination
for the award was published for several months in 2023 and at the close
of entries, many nominations of eminent persons were received, with Dr
Akinwumi Ayodeji Adesina, , emerging as a unanimous candidate for the 2023
award.
Expressing
his delight about the
award and being in the company of previous eminent recipients, Dr.
Akinwumi
Ayodeji Adesina, who has a FIVE POINT BLUEPRINT for repositioning the
African Development Bank { AfDB } said, “I am delighted to have been
selected as a
recipient of the prestigious Obafemi Awolowo Prize for Leadership.
Said he ,
"Joining Nobel Prize laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka and former President of
South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, as well as Aree Afe Babalola as prior
winners of the prize, is such a great honour.”
Adesina, a simply describes himself
as a ''Kenyan''' , is the eighth elected President of the AfDB and the
first Nigerian to be so elected to that exalted Executive position,
having been elected to the position on May 28, 2015 for the first
by the Bank’s Board of Governors at its Annual Meetings held in Abidjan, Côte
d’Ivoire.
He was re-elected for a second term
in 2020 following an excellent performance acknowledged by supporters and
critics alike.
The High Five-point agenda of
Adesina’s presidency at the AfDB with the ambition to Feed Africa, Light Up
Africa, Industrialise Africa, Integrate Africa and Improve the Quality of Life
in Africa, was particularly lauded by the organisers as capable of putting the
development of the continent directly in the hands of its people.
As Nigeria,' s
President, His Excellency , Distinguished Bola Ahmed Tinubu ,
GCFR , attends the occasion, topical energy issues and Policy
concepts, are expected to come up for mention.
President Samia Suluhu Hassan
of Tanzania, Nigeria,'s second military Head of State, General
Yakubu Gowon, GCFR ,one of Nigeria's foremost University students Union
activist, who was the footsoldier of the famous 1977 Col Ali Must Go NUNS
nationwide students demonstration, Chief Wole Olaoye, a Director of Academy
Press Limited Lagos & CEO Diametrics Ltd, amongst others.
Issues, values and norms
of clean, sustainable and affordable renewable projections , thtough
off-grid, solar mini-grid as well as the interconnected hybrid
mini-gtid , in all undeserved and unserved rural communities In Nigeria.
Happily, the Lightening
Up & Power Africa initiative introduced by the
President of the African Development Bank { AfDB } as one of his
FIVE-POINT Development Administration AGENDA to turn around the fortunes
of the African continent through massive rural electrification projects , would
certainly be of immense benefits to Nigeria, given the huge fiscal instruments
investments , ploughed in by the Nigerian Government.
Interestingly, the AfDB Lightening
Up & Power Africa Concept, falls within the global expectations of
UNIVERSAL ACCESS to electricity.
The fact that this well deserved and
prestigious award on Dr Akinwumi Ayodeji Adlesina, is coming at a time the
energy challenges in Africa, are getting increasingly multifaceted,
attempting to cripple credible efforts by more than 54 African nations ,
at food security and feeding their various populations, industrializing and
integrating their nations as well as improving the quality of life of the
citizenry, shows that this biennial event is not only timely , highly strategic
but one developing economies in Africa, including Nigeria, would benefit from
to reflect on the five-point agenda of Dr Akinwumi Ayodeji Adesina's
tenure as the President of the African Development Bank.
Universal access to electricity ,
aims at recording the following scorecard , (1) No fewer than 162 GM of
generated electricity (2) 130 million on-grid connections. (3) 75 million
off-grid connections.
The above figures, show some level
of worrisomeness, when we consider that well over 640 million Africans,
including Nigerians, have no access to electrical energy sources, offering an
electricity access rate for African nations, at just 40% , making it the lowest
globally.
