By Martin Paul
Executive secretary, National Universities Commission (NUC), Professor Julius Okojie, has become the third African to be inducted Fellow of the Association of Business Executives (ABE).
At the investiture held at the Institute of Financial Services, University College, London, United Kingdom, Okojie also becomes the first African, who is not a head of state in Africa to receive the prestigious ABE Fellowship.
Former Head of Nigeria’s Interim Government, Chief Earnest Shonekan, and former Prime Minister of Botswana, were the first two Africans to receive the ABE Fellowship.
In his address at the induction ceremony, ABE’s Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Gareth Robinson, said that the Board of Governors, last November, approved Okojie’s Fellowship because he had “invested his career in developing education in Nigeria”.
He said that Okojie was a visionary thinker, adding that “big thinkers like him were not thinking about the issues of today, but about how to solve the problems of tomorrow”.
The ABE CEO also said that as a Fellow of ABE, Okojie would be recognised around the world as an “Ambassador of a non-profit organisation, a globally recognised qualification for underdeveloped countries around the world”.
He added that the ABE Board had every confidence that giving his pedigree, courage, passion and vision, Okojie would play his ambassadorial role as an ABE Fellow creditably.
In his acceptance speech, Okojie thanked the ABE group for the confidence reposed in him, saying that Fellowship has witnessed a new beginning between Nigeria and the association. He said that the NUC would ensure the development of a good Quality Assurance concept for all ABE qualifications in Nigeria and tackle the issue of funding.
Okojie also said that the NUC was looking forward to the development of real Entrepreneurship Centres, properly equipped and fully funded.
He frowned at the makeshift entrepreneurship centres existing in some Nigerian universities, assuring the ABE that its certification would be fully quality-assured, guaranteed and endorsed by the Commission.
He, thanked the Association and Chairman House Committee on Education, the founder of WiniGroup and others for their kind words about him and further thanked members of his family for their support and understanding.
