Onyeka Onwenu is to offer leadership
to an organisation that needs to be
taken to new levels of relevance,
credibility and visibility.
Onyeka Onwenu’s story would most
probably be very different today if she
was given her due after her youth service
with the Nigerian Television Authority,
decades ago.
Some still recall how she changed the
face of television news reporting in
Nigeria, at least from the news
presentation we were all familiar with at
the time. Crisp, professional and
confident about her capacity without
flaunting it, the NYSC news
correspondent who returned to Nigeria
with a Masters’ Decree had everything
going for her as a well-trained media
professional.
She trusted her capacity, rather than
other ‘matters arising’, to earn a place in
order to serve her fatherland. It didn’t
quite work out the way many cheerful
observers had expected.
There was profound consternation when
she was not retained by the NTA after
her National Service.
Then her music, which was peculiarly her
own, came without warning.
If not for her current appointment,
Onyeka would most probably have spent
the rest of her life known to the much
younger generation of Nigerians as
another iconic singer and part-time
actress with good elocution and above
average self-possession.
It is also very likely that she would not be
where she is at the moment, but for the
First Lady’s drive on women issues and
the president’s leaning towards
capacitating women in the public domain
via appointments. So, welcome to the
new story of Onyeka Onwenu that is
about to begin, following her appointment
as the Executive Director/CEO of the
National Council for Women
Development (NCWD).
The new position is both an exciting and a
delicate one, demanding great political
maturity, profound women (not just
people) skills and a team disposition. She
must strive to ensure that no personal
qualities stand in her way, as she has to
deal with various strata of society.
Onyeka Onwenu is to offer leadership to
an organisation that needs to be taken to
new levels of relevance, credibility and
visibility.
But it is a level that must take it beyond
the stereotypes we are familiar with, to
where the rest of the right-headed world
is. That is why she must do everything
which her years of experience and
exposure have taught her to ensure she
gives competent leadership in her new
position.
Remi Oyo, former Managing Director of
the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) and
Ifueko Omoigui-Okauru, former head of
the Federal Inland Revenue Service
(FIRS), left exceptionally commendable
precedents in this regard.
Their tenure and trajectory leaves no one
in doubt today that these two women,
among others, understood that all it takes
to move an organisation to new heights
of excellence and service efficiency is a
leadership that has its wits about it in
every respect.
They understood that to offer leadership
is not the same thing as merely to be the
CEO, give orders and generally “be in
charge”. A person in charge in a 21st
century world must be in charge of the
right value paradigms for transformation,
sustainability, effective and relevant
partnerships, as well as processes and
procedures that ensure and preserve best
practices.
Remi Oyo and Ifueko Omoigui-Okauru
offered competent leadership as seen in
their personal psychological maturity and
thorough understanding of the real
challenges of the operating environment.
They took everything beyond the
institutional or structural challenges facing
their respective organisations at the time
they took office and broke new grounds.
These two women, during their tenure in
the aforementioned organisations,
operated with well thought out templates
for resurrecting the souls of NAN and
FIRS.
They also ensured sustainable
management of the human and material
resources entrusted to them.
Yes, they went beyond merely holding
fort to completely re-engineer these
public institutions; unconsciously making
themselves prime candidates for possible
prosecution for the unheard-of crime of
being highly efficient, effective, respected,
unobtrusive and truly transformational
leaders.
They had so much to lament about, but
they did not. They had more than enough
reasons to put on airs following their track
record early on the beat, but they did
not.
They had such brilliant ideas about what
to do but they did not advertise their
brilliance or distract anyone by verbal
extravagance.
They could have incorporated a fiery
messianic temper into every utterance
and written word, but they did not.
They had so much to lament about in
terms of the challenges and even official
obstacles they met, but they avoided any
proclivity for ‘lamentational’ public
commentary – even as they dealt with all
manner of benumbing issues.
Omoigui-Okauru took on all comers in a
sector that was densely populated by
individuals and organisations whose
subversive creativity keeping and
reprehensible book keeping would leave
Sherlock Holmes speechless.
But no one heard her voice, except when
she had perfected a policy or intervention
template that made yet another antic of
tax dodgers unattractive. She felt no need
to demonise anyone, but focused on the
simple fact that FIRS needed to chart a
course for the citizens and the national
treasury.
Having designed the new road, she
installed road signs, defined penalties for
non-compliance and deployed enforcers
to keep everyone on the slippery path of
rectitude.
And, lest we forget, all this came after
and along with painstaking public
education initiatives that are fool-proof
and ever on-going!
Remi, on her part will forever introduce
herself as “ A Reporter”. Take her on and
she will cheerily reply, ‘Okey my brother,
this MD business means that I have to
ensure that news is available by making
the report available.
Therefore, I am a reporter’. If you accuse
her of misinforming herself about her
status she will quickly retort that the only
time she will worry is if the public and the
profession she is serving complains of
being misinformed. Remi Oyo? The
woman should be restrained o! See what
she made of NAN, as she built on all the
gains from those before her! Capacity,
infrastructure, revenue generation,
institutional credibility, international
standing and much more tumbled out
huge positives under her watch.
But you will not easily notice Remi in a
‘crowd’ of three people. Ditto for Ifueko.
The two ladies seem to be in hiding at the
moment, but no one should allow them
get away with such mischief! Please fish
them out for more work.
An essential element in the obviously
successful tenure of the two ladies is
their clear knowledge of the political
economy of the sectors they were getting
into.
Every leader must have this, in addition
to knowing the interests that must be
taken into account so as to move
forward. Some of these interests are to
be accommodated, while others are to be
creatively led off to the undertaker. It is
interests that often come under the
omnibus, if not nebulous, title of
‘stakeholders’. A leader who defines his
stakeholders wrongly is already a failure.
The spectacular failure of several reform
efforts of the federal government over
the years is traceable to this one failing.
Over and over again, otherwise gifted
public office holders across all industry
divides achieve much less than they are
capable of because they take off with the
mistaken assumption that ‘the good guys’,
who want to create El-Dorado on planet
earth (and even in hell, for all you know)
are the only real stakeholders to be
taken seriously.
A good deal of the time, ‘the bad guys’
are actually the ones to be taken much
more seriously and sometimes even into
confidence on how their interests could
be modified to accommodate a wider
bracket of beneficiaries. Sometimes all
that the bad guys need is education on
the unsustainability of their platforms and
how unfolding events would make them
unviable in a year or two.
Going back to Remi, no one knew of her
battles with editors and media owners
who would take NAN content without the
simple courtesy of acknowledgment. All
her years of media work and
management were collapsed into a
personal resolve to help develop the
simple business of news procurement,
selling and buying into the great asset it
is in many nations of the world.
As we welcome Onyeka Onwenu to what
will undoubtedly be an eventful national
assignment, let us also remind her that
she will be dealing with her fellow
women.
It is rumoured that they are difficult to
manage, when they are all by themselves.
I refrain from any personal comment on
the latter claim as I am neither a women
nor a rumour monger. Suffice it to point
out that the CEO of NCWD will not be
managing a corporate platform with
sometimes unimpeachable Rules of
Engagement.
What will most probably put Onyeka in
good stead is the fact that her upbringing
gave her the opportunity to understand
some fundamental cultural issues that
could impact positively on women
development and empowerment if they
are properly understood and harnessed.
But she must seek a new understanding
and definition of womanhood itself.
Motherhood does not necessarily
translate into womanhood as such. Yes it
is possible to be a mother in the
biological sense and yet not be a genuine
woman in the spiritual sense.
Congratulation, Onyeka Onwenu and may
your path lead in the right direction!
Values! The new CEO of NCWD must
begin her interventions by clarifying and
redefining the core values that have
guided our understanding and use of our
women for far too long.
Why is it that they are often presented as
just side entertainment and ‘dancing
things’ at political rallies? When will
women cease to present themselves as
part of the menu at public events and
conferences? Is there a role for young
ladies in the council and should Onwenu
think of occasional consultaticve forum
with female Head Girls, etc. and how is
she going to navigate the troubled waters
of onter-agency rivalry and sundry land
mines all over the place.
She can do it, of course and a clear
template of implementable actions with
measurable results which enjoys wide
strakeholder ownership will see her
through.
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