Lack of succession plan ruining businesses in Nigeria – Obasanjo

With the successful commissioning in March this year of the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, the project is set to go full throttle. In this exclusive interview with ZEBULON AGOMUO, Editor, BDSUNDAY, the visioner, Olusegun Obasanjo, a former president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, inside the sprawling complex housing the Library, in Abeokuta, Ogun State, speaks on the place of presidential library in a modern society; plan to promote the historical and cultural artifacts of the country; the need to revamp the near-moribund National Museum, return History as a distinct subject of study in schools, among other issues. Excerpts:  

Your Excellency, congratulations on the successful commissioning of the Presidential Library. What have been the quality and level of patronage since the launch?   

Thank you. We did the launching and all that. Well, we are still less than six months. We launched March 4 this year. What I will say is that people are becoming more and more aware not only of the existence of the library but also what it means. One of the things that I enjoy, not really, indicating that people know what Presidential Library is all about, is people sending me books, saying ‘we donate to your Presidential Library’. But Presidential Library is, of course, more than a store of books. If there are books at all, they would be, probably, personal book library of the president and name is attached to the library. A Presidential Library is a museum; Presidential Library is an archive; it is a centre of intellectual activity. Presidential Library for us is a store of the past and meant to capture the present and also to inspire the future. Now, you don’t get all these in a book library so to say. And then, a Presidential Library must also be active and alive. There must be something going on there all the time. Now, when you take all these, this particular library, we commissioned it on March 4 and so, the awareness has started to grow; people have started to understand what a Presidential Library is all about; but is still very much work in progress. There are still aspects of the Presidential Library that have not been fully completed. For instance, you have the Youths’ Development Centre, which must have a little hostel of its own. It has a camp for youths’ activities. The hostel is in the process of being completed. We have Biomedical Centre, which is going to be part of the components of this complex. The aim is that it should be able to train those technologists that can look after very expensive medical equipment: CT Scan, MRI, X-ray, because  they are some of the things that are lacking, and they are important if we are partnering with those that will give us a little bit of service delivery. The mosque has been commissioned near the Imam house too; because the Imam has to lead prayer five times a day; he has to be able to lead prayer early in the morning, so his place of abode must be very close to the mosque. We have a Senior Citizens’ Centre; where senior citizens can come and relax among themselves; interact among themselves. That also is about to be completed. So, we have those things that have been completed- the sports arena, the guest house; the events centre; the children amusement park- those are now very active.

You talked about the youth’s hostel, which means you are really interested in them knowing the history of…

Of course, history is very important. Here we say maintain the past, capture the present and inspire the future. Therefore, if you don’t know where you are coming from, you may as well don’t have the compass as to where you are going. History is both a clock…

But History is no longer being taught in our schools the way it should?

I believe it is a mistake. Some of us are now advocating that this should be corrected in our own schools, both in primary, secondary and in university. We have said this is the history of Nigeria; it meant a lot to us and must be taught in our schools. We said it is a mistake that we do not let people know their history and that it should be corrected.

Your Excellency, one of the problems we have in this country is lack of succession plan. Some of the businesses that thrived in the past have gone moribund because there was no succession plan. What plan have you put in place to make this place viable after the founder?

Well, first of all, this is not a family business and it is not even a personal business. The Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library Foundation (OOPL) is a foundation and we have a board of trustees. We have two co-chairs, Christopher Kolade and another friend of ours, Ambassador Carl Masters. Then we have distinguished Nigerians, men and women who are on the board. I have no locus standi. I am not on the board of trustees. The position I hold is what we call chief promoter. That’s my position. And chief promoter does not appear on the registration papers. They can sack me tomorrow. But now that we are becoming operational, in addition to the chief promoter, what the board of trustees said to me is look: ‘we will manage, we will run, but we are not going to start looking for money. You will be the one to look for money’. That is my job as chief promoter. Now that it is operational and functional institution, I take on the duty of coordinator and the young man here (pointing to a staff sitting opposite him), Ayo Adenrinwale who is supposed to be deputy, is standing in and running things when I am not there and even when I am there. (On a lighter mood) – He is not just satisfied with deputy coordinator; he calls himself deputy chief coordinator. So, I am coordinator, he is deputy chief coordinator, which means his position is even higher than mine (laughing heartily). But on a serious note, you are absolutely right; one of the things that is wrong with businesses in our land is that succession plan is made personal; when the owner or the proprietor of the business is ill, and when he dies, the business becomes shaky.  Only yesterday they were telling me about one particular business like that; and they asked one of their directors to come and brief me, and he said to me, ‘we were directors, we didn’t know as much as we should know about this business when the owner was alive. Now that the owner is dead we couldn’t go anywhere’. I think that is a pity. Now, we have made sure that the main library, what we call ‘base building’ cannot by itself maintain itself. So, that is why we have got all the ancillaries or subsidiaries, or whatever you want to call them, like the guest house, events centre, children amusement park; like the cinema, the youth development. We hope to make enough money to keep the complex going.

Is there any plan to list the OOPL on the Stock Exchange?

No. It is not a business. It cannot be listed on the stock exchange. It is a non-for-profit organisation. I know you are business-minded. Maybe, if you come to talk to me about my farms that is purely business, we can talk about that. But OOPL is a non-for-profit organisation and question of listing it on the Stock Exchange does not arise.

You said the Presidential Library is not just about books. With what you have here, it really goes beyond books; it is a kind of museum. Are you worried about the state of the (Nigerian) National Museum?

We are worried about that and I believe that one of the things that we can do, is for us here to see what we can do to help the National Museum. I think there should be a symbiotic relationship. In terms of training, in terms of what we are doing that they can copy, in terms of even sharing what they have, so that in these days of digitisation and all that, there are many things that we can share, so that preservation is ensured.

We know that this is not about books. But we also know that many youths of this country are today not interested in even using the available libraries to their own advantage. What do you think is the missing link?

That is why in here, we have to think of the present and the future. By the time you walk round our museum and our archive, there are enough of interactive electronic things, games and plays that will keep the interest of youths alive and keep them engaged. There is also what to listen to and all that. Yes, it has to be made lively and relevant to the youths.

You know for some time now, we have been hammering on diversification of the economy from oil, particularly going into agric; do you think we have made progress in this regard?

I believe we have in the past. Only we have not been consistent and we have not sustained it. And we should continue to do it. We have to. Now, let me just give you two examples: when I took over as president in 1999, I checked by the year 2000, our cocoa production was 150, 000 metric tonnes. Then we decided to go into cocoa and revive it. But the time I left in 2007, our cocoa production had gone to 400, 000 metric tonnes. When we took over, our cassava production was 30 million metric tonnes, by the time we left, we were 50 million metric tonnes. And by then, we were saying, add cassava flour into bread and all that. Now, if we have done that consistently and all that, the story would have been different. So we can and we should. And with time, we’ll have no choice.