Monthly Archives: March 2009

Adeolu Akinyemi
March 27, 2009

Rebranding Reloaded


I had two great meetings yesterday, one was the Future Movement’s steering committee meeting, and the other one was a  New Nigeria Club Online Conference. I’m so thrilled at the key issues we were able to trash out in both meetings yesterday. I’m particularly impressed with how much we are achieving with the online conferences, technology is sure making things easier.

There was an interesting eye opener during the NNC online conference though, and I think it’s an idea I should quickly bring back on board and re-communicate. With so many great heads brainstorming together, we were able to obtain a good variation of personalizing our issues with our leaders’ name concept. I was thrilled with the additions and have decided to capture it as Rebranding Nigeria, Reloaded! Rather than sound abusive or use words that might ultimately lead us nowhere, we have decided to add an interesting positive tweak to the personifications. Here are the thoughts. Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 25, 2009

ReBuilding Nigeria!


What I want to write today is an article I will love you to pirate. I’ll like you to dub it, and put it on your blog post. Modify it if you like, give me credit if you want, or give me none at all. They say we’ll achieve a lot more if we don’t care who gets the credit. 

I have refrained deliberately for a long time to make any comments about our National Rebranding exercise. I hope I will be able to say what boils in my throat and wrists tonight, without making too much reference to it. For all it’s worth though, I think the fundamental error I can see, is that Nigerians have not been made to own it, and hence rather than having people championing it, and helping others buy in, what we have is criticism and condemnation by the same people who would have been it’s champions.

Having said that however, I have a proposition of an exercise that we can own as Nigerians. It’s a simple idea and it came as a fallout of a discussion that ensued in my office yesterday.  It’s an answer of what we can do to focus our leaders on the problems that we have as citizens and to assist them in giving it the attention it deserves. We no longer need any assitance from any source to know that our most crucial problem in Nigeria is Leadership! If we are all on the same page in this realization, then our efforts towards a better Nigeria must be channeled to support, focus and direct our leaders. Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 23, 2009

Where are You?


Where are you? Can you attempt to answer that question? While you are at it, that was the first question that man was ever faced with. The Bible records in the book of Genesis chapter 3 verse 9 : GOD called to the Man: “Where are you?”  I recon that since it is the almighty asking the question, it wasn’t because he didn’t know the answer. Asking however, makes the one being asked to ask him or herself a fundamental question that can help in quick recovery. 

I would have thought that the first question that God would have asked man was the question of “who are you?”, “why are you here?” e.t.c. The first question however was not any of these soul searching philosophical questions, the first question was, “where are you?”. Who you are was done and delivered before you were formed, it’s not an answer you cook, it’s an answer you find. It’s the same with why you are here, the answer existed before you were formed in your mother’s womb. Where you are however, is interestingly your doing, and you are answerable to God! Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 21, 2009

Helpful Tips – Egypt Recap


I came back into Nigeria yesterday, and I have been tongue and finger tied. When you learn too much in one doze, it can lead to intellectual constipation. In these kind of times, it pays to sit still for a while and let it all sink in. Afterall, it’s not what we learn that matters, it’s what we do with what we learn. 

It’s been 9 days of interacting with nature and history! I’ve been around a few countries prior to now, my first visit to Dubai made me feel that Dubai was the ultimate tourist attraction from Africa to Asia, but the number of tourists I came into contact with in Egypt, is a record I’m not sure will be beaten in a long time! Whereas in Dubai the crowd clusters were in shopping malls, in Egypt people queued in front of Tombs, in front of Temples, Mosques, Churches and Museums. People paid, yesterday night I counted my own tickets, to learn about the past. American’s, Europeans, Asians, Africans, Australians, all the continents were there, everybody taking out time to be on vacation, looking for something, asking questions, and where they were allowed, taking pictures. Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 14, 2009

Lessons from Egypt


There is so much to see about Egypt, interestingly there is so much to say as well. The Egyptian civilization is the oldest dated civilization. They have islands and temples that date back to 5000BC. Some of the sites are breath taking and some of the history, mind boggling. Egypt has managed to preserve a lot of it’s history, maximize the use of the Nile and  sufficiently diversify it’s sources of income. 

One thing you cannot but notice about Egypt however is how grossly similar with Nigeria Egypt is. I have traveled to a few countries, but I’m yet to see so much similarity. Egypt also is a land so blessed, but it’s people so poor. When I listened to our tour guide describe Egypt, and the resources he knows that Egypt has, my mind wanders freely back to my country. I’m not every normal vacationer in Egypt, my eyes are covered with the lens of my nations transformation. Wherever I go, one this is on my mind – what as a Nation can we learn from these other countries to better the lot of our nation Nigeria? So, today, from the Land of the Pharaohs, from the land where life after death means more than life on earth, from the land of many temples and rich history, I bring you Lessons from Egypt! Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 12, 2009

Do You Have Dreams?


{Sightseeing should start tomorrow. You can keep up with the interesting things in Egypt as I try to give daily updates on my twitter section here or on facebook. Should see the pyramids closely tommorrow, then go for a 3 days cruise on the Nile. Tomorrow, I might be interviewing an inspirational South African Lady I met here… just thinking out loud :) )

We all grew up as young children full of dreams. We wanted to become this, to have that, and to go everywhere. When we saw an aircraft on TV, we wanted one, when we saw a big house, we dreamt we would own it, we even fantasised about the definition of beauty that the media had sold to us. If every anything we were dreamers, our imaginations ran ahead of our realities, we wanted more from life than mere existence. We had big dreams, and somehow in our minds, we were unstoppable.  As a child, I can’t remember ever worrying about how I was going to ever study Aeronautics Engineering.

As we grow up however, our dreams grow with us, but somewhere along the line, many of us lose the youthfulness to dream. We are so caught up in waking up early, spending quality time in traffic, coming back late, that we have lost our dreams. We have become realists, we face the facts rather than the possibilities, we live the lives of drugged zombies, repeating the same routine day in day out, and hoping for the “one day”. If it is true, that repeating the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result is insanity, then we might indeed need to submit ourselves to some counselling. Some of us however have dreams, we still nurse them, we still hold them dear and are working towards them. Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 10, 2009

Buckets or Piplines Reloaded.


I’ve been falling in love with this story over and over again in the last few days, so much so that I’m going to dwell on it a bit more again today. Today however, I’ll be focusing more on the pipes than the buckets. I’ll also like to attach a document that one of the readers of this site sent to me as well, the reader had apparently gone online to search for the story and found it. It’s titled “Parable of the Pipeline”. I’ll like you to download it here and enjoy reading it.

I just heard a recap of BankPHB’s advert on radio focused on  Jack and Jill that went up the hill to fetch a pail of water, and how Jack decided to build a pipe and make a fortune :) . Guess buckets and pipes are an emerging theme on not a few minds. I’ll  start by picking out a few points from the detailed article on the parable of the pipeline, then I’ll talk about the different ways of building pipelines, and their cost implications. I’ll share my recommendations with you, offer myself and services and leave you with the choices. Continue reading →

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Adeolu Akinyemi
March 5, 2009

What the World Owes You


 

Announcement: There will be a Business Opportunity Meeting on Saturday 1pm, 3rd Floor, 71 Allen Avenue, Ikeja Lagos. If you are interested or you want to book a sit for your friends. Send a text to 08034772724. Send the names, and phone numbers. It’s Free this Weekend.

theworld

“Life is a gift, and it offers us the privilege, opportunity, and responsibility to give something back by becoming more” – Anthony Robbins.

I have been extremely busy in the last few days, travel, meeting, e.t.c. I’ve been unable to sit down and craft out the thoughts of my heart. I have many pending things to say, and as I write this morning, my heart is being tugged into many directions. I hope I’m able to withstand the temptation of writing 3 articles within the next 2 days J. 

I read a story sometime ago, about a young lad who was caught by the police for snatching a wallet with less than $10. He was caught, kept in custody for a while and  later arraigned before a juvenile court. When the judge asked him weeks later, why he had stolen the wallet, the young lad replied, “because the world owes me a living”. Apparently he had grown to buy the philosophy freely expressed in his environment. That we did not ask to be in this world, and hence the world owes us a living. Of course if you live in the west, it probably is easier to develop this mind frame, even the way the governments operate, it’s easy for the people to feel they are entitled to somethings. Interestingly however, we who live in the side of the world where our government makes it clear that we are not entitled to anything, still live like we are. We waste our time and energies demanding and hoping for entitlements! Continue reading →

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