By Rogers Edor Ochela
For staff and volunteers of the Peace Corps of Nigeria (PCN), history was made on Tuesday, February 28, 2017, when their National Commandant, Ambassador (Dr) Dickson Ameh Ojonye Akoh, was invested with three awards at the new corporate headquarters of the corps in Jabi, Abuja. The investiture was in recognition of Akoh’s sterling leadership qualities.
That these awards are coming at a most auspicious occasion in the history of the youth-based PCN cannot be over-emphasized. Occasions of this nature are simply periods for sober reflection and stock-taking; personalities with eyes on the verdict of history use this kind of occasion to reflect on their role(s) viz-a-viz their contributions to the upliftment or otherwise of their societies.
For the reticent Dr. Akoh, he would have wished that this wonderful occasion of the award of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah Outstanding Merit Award (to be awarded by Nkrumah Vanguard Movement); Idoma Personality of the year 2016 (by Idoma Voice) and Most Outstanding Nigerian 2016 (by Nigerian Advocate) be observed silently by his inclination as an introvert.
A peep into Akoh’s trajectory reveals that he has, indeed, paid his dues in service of the fatherland, especially on youth empowerment through PCN.
When he was born on July 10, 1973, little did his parents know that the little Ameh would later conquer the world through doggedness, exceptional brilliance, hard work and above all, courage forged in the furnace of perseverance! Akoh, a rugged man by all standards, loves challenges. He is always happy when confronted with challenges as it affords him the opportunity to prove his worth. Easy-going, level-headed, unassuming and God-fearing, his life has enough deep valleys to make a movie script.
At primary school, excellence was his watchword. Rather than occupy himself with the exuberance of his peers, Akoh developed passion for hard work.
His academics took a quantum leap at University of Abuja, where he obtained a degree in Sociology. Akoh, who also has honorary Doctor of Philosophy (Humanities) of the Commonwealth University, Belize, is currently undergoing a Masters Degree programme in Criminology at the University of Abuja.
In between these academic schedules, Dickson Akoh’s legendary passion for youth matters shot to the fore with formation of Peace Corps of Nigeria (PCN), after trying his hands on several other activities such as Pioneer Commandant of Army Cadet (1989) and Nigerian Leadership and Marshal Corp (1990), etc.
Since he singlehandedly established Peace Corps of Nigeria, Akoh has weathered diverse storms, ranging from harassment of the corps from some envious security organizations; detention of Akoh on flimsy excuses to the recent opposition to the passage of the Bill to give the corps statutory backing. But the national commandant remained dogged, and focused, culminating in the passage of the Bill currently awaiting presidential assent.
The icing on the cake of the corps’ journey to stardom under Akoh’s pragmatic leadership is that today, it has over one hundred and thirty thousand regular members and volunteers with functional offices in the 36 states of the federation, including the Federal Capital Territory. It is expected that Mr. President’s assent to this Bill will reinvigorate the corps in the discharge of its core mandate as epitomized in catering to the needs of the youths, the most vulnerable segment of the nation’s population.
In his determination to bequeath a viable corps to the nation, Dickson Akoh earned the respect of several well-meaning Nigerians and the international community, which earned the Corps Special Consultative Status by the United Nations and African Union under their Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
In 18 years, PCN has instituted awards like Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); Senior Advocate of Peace; International Peace Medal and International Special Peace Envoy; visited Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) Camp at Durumi, Abuja and Suleja Prisons, where relief materials were donated and 40 inmates set free; signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Hajiya Hadiza Buhari’s Africa Support and Empowerment Initiative (AFRISEI) for rehabilitation of the released Chibok Girls, where the corps donated N3.5million to this noble cause and recently, the corps visited the Special School for IDPs in Gwarinpa where it also donated writing materials and food items
Akoh is a detribalized Nigerian with a large heart. The list of the management staff of the corps, his aides and staff of the corps are amazingly a roll call of Nigerians from the six geo-political zones of the country. If a sizeable percentage of Nigerians in leadership positions could imbibe half of Akoh’s abiding spirit and principles, at least, a powerful nay destructive arrow would have been removed from the quivers of proponents of ethnicity as a principle of state policy.
Like a bricklayer, Akoh has over the past 18years been laying blocks upon blocks of PCN’s strategic survival with dexterity, engineering the organization’s phenomenal growth. These three epochal awards to this humble man are merited.
Akoh is Chairman, Board of Trustees of the National Youth Council in Nigeria; Associate Member of the International Biographical Centre, London. He has won many awards including: Ambassador of Peace; Fellow, Chartered Institute of Trustees; Fellow, Chartered Institute of Local Government Administration; Fellow, National Security and Intelligence Studies; Merit Award of Methodist Church of Nigeria and Catholic Church of Nigeria.
Others are Integrity Award, Ugboju Progressive Association; MDG Ambassador, Teachers Without Borders; Youth Ambassador of Peace, Youth Federation for World Peace and the Ogigo mebe (Mirror) of Ugboju land, etc. Akoh’s leadership qualities that paved the way for these awards to ‘rain’ on him should be emulated by all and sundry in Nigeria. Indeed, Akoh has paid his dues deserving applause of all Nigerians, especially the youths, the major focus of his soldering in the wilderness of life all these years.
Ochela is an Abuja based public affairs analyst
