Emelayo Nwosu
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has narrated how renowned banker and businessman, Tony Elumelu, took over the Transnational Corporation of Nigeria after the other pioneer investors divested the holdings in the organization.
Chief Obasanjo revealed this in an exclusive interview in the C-Suite Café podcast anchored by Ikem Okuhu in which the former president spoke on various national and international issues. (https://youtu.be/CTrlLMyd_xs?si=oJLfKy2enRi-dbN6)
Explaining that the refusal of the former Director-General of the Nigerian Stock Exchange, Ndi Okereke-Onyiuke, “to let go” forced other investors, including Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, to pull out of the corporation, Obasanjo said Elumelu “stocked up and continued with it.”
He said the idea behind Transcorp was to replicate similar corporations in other countries—and having seen how such organizations worked in those countries—he conceived a huge corporation with interests in oil and gas, manufacturing, finance other areas as a Nigerian version.
“I was actually trying to copy South Korea, where LG and others were given support by government and that was the way to go.
“And I asked myself, when I was in government, whether as military head of state or elected president, presidents of other countries were talking to me about their own companies.
“The British were talking to me, the French were talking to me, the Americans were talking to me. Why can’t I build my own up and also see whether I can talk to other countries about our own, which I did,” Obasanjo said.
He said that in planning the establishment of Transcorp, his administration gave it all the support it needed to succeed, including allocating an oil block to it, and ensured that social encumbrances that could hinder its growth were removed.
“I said, if I take one individual in Nigeria, then it will become politicized, tribalized and all that; and I must say those people in the corporate world went along with me and we established and it was going well.
“It got to the point where it should be, more or less, on its own. I had even called Christopher Kolade, who was the High Commissioner in London, to come back to manage it since he managed Cadbury. And he had agreed.
“But the woman in Stock Exchange would not allow that. That’s what killed it.
“The first thing was the purchase of the hotel in Abuja, Transport Hilton. I gave them oil block. So, that was it. Unfortunately, it flopped.
“But it was the stock exchange woman who didn’t let go when she should have let go. That was it.”
Obasanjo pointed out that he backed Dangote up when he started his own corporation after withdrawing from Transcorp and took him to many African countries.
“Then, of course, Aliko started his own and Aliko was backed up. Not only was he backed up locally, I took Aliko to Ethiopia, Senegal, Tanzania and Zambia.
“That is it, but you have to do that to develop and protect your own industry and your own private sector,” the former president said.
How Tony Elumelu Took Over Transcorp—Obasanjo
Leave a Reply