A Patriot Full of Guts and Vision

Nduka Irabor

The youngest of a brood of children of a famously strict educationist and clergyman, is an enigma to some, but anecdotal accounts of his formative years help to better situate Dr. Mike Adeniyi Ishola Adenuga Jnr. One of such well-worn stories was that young Mike Adenuga sold part of what was standard issue comestibles to high school mates from his over stock. Truth is, as his surviving older siblings testify, “Niyi”, who led the family morning prayers, was not as inclined to bible studies as their towering father rammed down as he was to mama’s thriving commerce.

Amongst items Mike Adenuga’s mother traded was the tin, rectangular boxes for school pupils-now replaced in modern times by backpacks, which she fabricated and sold to schools within Ibadan and environs. Mike, her youngest son was one of her many vendors. He always wanted to work for what was provided for him and siblings for free. Unmistakably, those were early signs of an entrepreneurial spirit, which he carried on to his college years in the United States.

The Guru, the Bull, the Grandmaster or simply Chairman; all these aliases by which Dr. Adenuga (Grand Commander of the Order of the Niger GCON, Commander of the Legion of Honour – the highest national award bestowed by France) is known, do not sufficiently capture the impact which the man, who turns 70 years old today, has had on business and society in Nigeria and far beyond.

Adenuga, mega-successful entrepreneur, innovator and patriot to the core sees the world as a huge canvas of opportunities on which men with guts and vision can paint masterfully. He imagines the world as a vineyard from which the sweet wine of success is squeezed by only those who believe, and are ready to work relentlessly.

Adenuga’s journey through the harsh and unpredictable modern business vineyard has brought well deserved rewards for him and transformed the landscape in banking, real estate, communication and oil and gas where his trail blazing efforts first came to public notice. The ability to spot opportunities and challenge conventions whilst seeking to extend frontiers make him at once enigmatic and charismatic.

The nation’s banking halls were fraught with long queues of customers in the 1990s until Adenuga led the way with his Equitorial Trust Bank to make banking hall transactions a pleasant experience. Conoil Producing became the first wholly indigenous oil company to discover and produce crude oil from acreage in the creeks of the Niger-Delta in 1991 whilst other license holders were busy shopping for foreign partners. Glo Mobile entered the market in 2003 as the only indigenous Telecoms player, and stirred up the market in such positive ways that Nigerian consumers of mobile telephone services were the ultimate beneficiaries of better pricing structure. He has held the national banner aloft and proudly in the instances where foreign companies were direct competition and could only have been repatriating the gains of local business. A very strong advocate of indigenous effort, Adenuga’s triumph over foreign behemoths in the enterprise privatization exercise by the Federal Government is legendary.

For Adenuga, enterprise for self-enrichment is nothing until it creates benefits for others. The Adenuga collective group of companies employs thousands of Nigerians and parade some of the longest serving employees. No Nigerian or Nigerian enterprise has supported local sports and entertainment industry the way he has done. The Mike Adenuga Foundation promotes business studies at the Ogun State University and the University of Lagos where he endows generously the School of Entrepreneurial Studies.

Still, in quiet sorties, he supports veterans from varied fields who have given the best of their prime to Nigeria. He has received high recognition at home and abroad for his worthy contributions to business and philanthropy.

He will be celebrated today as a patriot who, against many odds, has shown tact, courage, vision and invention, which shines through and projects hope for others in an ecosystem sometimes heavy with difficulties and doubt. He should deservedly be celebrated.