• Thursday, March 28, 2024
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Dakuku’s Strategic Turnaround showcases radical reform in Nigeria’s maritime sector, says Bellamy

Africa Day 2023: Dakuku to speak on Nigeria’s leadership role

Emeritus professor of Maritime Security at the University of Greenwich United Kingdom, Chris Bellamy, has described the book Strategic Turnaround: Story of a Government Agency as “a definitive case of successful high-level change management and essential insight into the maritime sector of an emerging maritime power”.

The book written by Dakuku Peterside, a columnist, scholar, management practitioner and former CEO of the Nigerian Maritime and Safety Agency (NIMASA), is set for release in January 2021 in hardcover, paperback, digital and audio book editions, according to Olayemi Onakunle, general manager, Safari Books Limited, Ibadan.

Bellamy, also a former professor of Military Science and doctrine at Cranfield University and editor-in-chief of International Journal of Maritime Crime and Security, who had the opportunity to preview the yet-to-be-released book, said it “showcases the radical reform of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) and the entire maritime sector in Nigeria by its leaders and key stakeholders”.

Strategic Turnaround briefly and eloquently tells the story of how strategic change was initiated, instigated, and successfully managed in Nigeria’s maritime sector. This story has far-ranging relevance within the horn of Africa and beyond.

Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa and the seventh most populous in the world with 206 million people in late 2019. Its maritime sector is highly significant: Nigeria has Africa’s largest economy and the 24th in the world, with a GDP estimated by the IMF at about $500 billion. Sometimes called the ‘Giant of Africa’ because of its large population and economy, it is one of the MINT countries named in 2011 – Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Turkey – as having great potential and offering potential great returns on investment in the next decade.

Nigeria’s maritime sector is of great importance, not only for indigenous transport but potentially globally. Oil is one of the critical cargoes.

“Nigeria hopes to compete with the Philippines in provision of seafarers. However, it also faces challenges. It lies on the Gulf of Guinea, which in 2013 surpassed Somali-based piracy in the western Indian Ocean as the world hot-spot for piracy and armed robbery at sea,” Bellamy said.

But he also had praises for the writing style infused with serious leadership, management, and maritime concepts as well as the book’s straightforward narrative that makes it easy for every scholar to understand how Dakuku’s leadership team applied leadership and management principles to change the maritime industry in Nigeria.