Elumelu drills Ghanaian Varsity students, youths on the ABC of entrepreneurship
Group chairman of UBA Plc, and founder of the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF), Mr. Tony Elumelu addressed Ghanaian youths on how to achieve business success early in life without failure.
Relying on his wealth of his business intelligence experience and in continuation of his strategic vision of engineering and robust business relationship across the continent using Africapitalism as a tool for development of Africa, he staged hundreds of Ghanaian youths, academics and entrepreneurs for hours in Accra.
While anchoring his presentation on the usefulness of preparedness, he stressed that “The first is dedication, then vision, focus, ambition, and our ability to do things when we want to do them. We must always remain laser focused and aim to execute to perfection”.
Elumelu made his audience to understand that all he mentioned aided him to drive one of the biggest mergers in Nigeria’s history to date which the merger of Standard Trust Bank (STB) and United Bank for Africa (UBA). The success of the merger can be seen on the stability of the bank and its current ranking as amongst the top 3 banks in the country and rapidly growing in Africa.
Explaining more, elated Elumelu said “I saw us grow a bank from 5 branches to 1000 branches with presence in 19 African countries and in Paris, London and New York. The lesson here is start small, have a purpose, be disciplined, and think long term”.
He averred that entrepreneurship is key to achieving poverty reduction and empowering Africans to solve its challenges without dependence on aid from western countries, stressing that “Knowledge has no currency or value. It is priceless, and there is no greater gift than the gift of knowledge”.
“Africans must come up with innovative, home grown solutions for challenges we continue to face.” He added that UBA embraces this innovation: “UBA was the 1st bank to encourage customers to come and bank with zero account balance.
Elumelu who had a presidential audience with President Nana Akufo-Addo, told his audience that they held fruitful discussions on matters of mutual benefit as well as deliberated on issues geared towards the growth and development of Finance and entrepreneurship in Ghana.
“I am delighted to be on this historic visit to Ghana which has been a shining light of UBA’s business across Africa. It was a great opportunity to meet with and congratulate the newly elected president of Ghana, His Excellency Nana Akufo-Addo and to extend our readiness to partner with his administration in the rapid development of Ghana and Africa at large. It was also an honour to meet with young and vibrant Students and share my Vision of Africapitalism,” Elumelu noted.
