Samson Adeosun is a young Nigerian entrepreneur who is making his mark in the construction industry in the United Kingdom (UK) where he’s been based for several years.
Adeosun and his friend Dayor Adeniyi are co-founders of ASQ – a training and assessment business with a specialisation in construction. They are planning to bring skills found in the UK into the Nigerian construction industry to eliminate the continuous quest for foreign skills.
The young entrepreneur says ASQ is looking at extending its frontiers to the Nigerian market and that they hope to build a training institute and galvanise graduates and O’ level certificate holders to take up career in various aspects of construction.
The young entrepreneur and his friend were both motivated by the success they have recorded in the UK to establish a Nigerian arm of the business.
According to them, ASQ in the last two years has trained about 5,000 people who are making an impact in the UK’s construction industry.
“We also train people on health and social care. These are National Vocational Qualifications (NVQ) in the UK,” Adeosun says.
Commenting on the training offered by ASQ, Adeosun says it ranges from level 1 (basis) to level 7 which is the highest— an equivalent of a master’s degree.
“Those entering level 1 are people who can read and write. These are the people we refer to as skilled workers. They include carpenters, bricklayers, and tillers among others,” he says.
“Level 2 to level 3 are the supervisors and it goes on like that to the manager level which are those on level 7,” he adds.
“What we are seeking to do is to see how we can bring the same quality of training to Nigeria. We have been certified to deliver the same training and we’re quite excited about that,” they both explain.
Another aspect of what Adeosun and Adeniyi are looking to encourage in Nigeria is in health and social care, as Nigeria presently lags behind in social care.
“A lot of people trying to do this in Nigeria are not certified,” they observe, adding that in the UK the social care sector is totally different.”
“We want to train people to take this up as a career. We’ll like to expose Nigerians to this space so that they become the best they can be as social caregivers. That’s why we believe the government must play its role by putting infrastructure in place,” he says.
They believe that since a chunk of the Nigerian population can read and write, all they need is a little training to bring out their best as obtained in the advanced economies.
The entrepreneurs intend to actualise these plans in Nigeria by liaising with the relevant authorities at federal, state and local government levels.
Adeosun says that the business’ short term plan is to acquire land in Lagos where it will build the institute and site office.
“It is going to be a satellite office that will liaise with our London office. Our examinations, qualifications, and certification will come from the UK,” Adeniyi says.
He explains further that once the Lagos office is set up, ASQ will be recruiting young graduates with IT skills and further train them to fit into ASQ’s operation.
This, both entrepreneurs say, will be the first phase to drive their operations into the Nigerian market and settle down for the onerous task that lies ahead.
The second phase will be to acquire a sizeable piece of land that will be used to train people on how to operate heavy-duty machines such as cranes and forklifts at construction sites.
The whole idea, they explain, is to ensure that young Nigerians acquire skills that make them marketable home or abroad.
They strongly believe that such skills and the certification they carry are urgently needed to address burgeoning unemployment among the youth population.
JOSHUA BASSEY
