PEFON Induction June 2015

June 20^th  was a date I needed to keep as directed by my Boss, my Sole Administrator. But the day started as a dull day. The rain started quite early and throughout that morning, it rained. At a point I started praying because, I was scared that the rain would stop me from attending the Award and Induction ceremony of the Professional  Excellence  Foundation of  Nigeria.

My Sole Administrator, Eng Joe Isah of Ajaokuta Steel Company Limited was being honoured and inducted as a Distinguished Fellow of the Foundation and I was to stand in for him. I did not want to get there late and with the rain, I was really worried. Also my brother who is to drive me to the venue,  stays in another area that gets flooded easily.   I had to be calling him every other hour to remind him that its raining (as if he doesn’t already know that) and that we need to leave the mainland earlier than we agreed.

The rain had been raining since morning and our street was flooded. The other staff, Raphael that was to go with me called that he would not make it as his area was flooded too. Since I was directly instructed by my SOLAD, I had to go alone.

I got to the Venue in Victoria Island by 2pm, an hour before the commencement of the event. Everywhere was flooded and I feared that people would not show up but they did. Although  the turn out was low, it was still memorable.

I met some of Nigerians best professionals in Pharmacy, Banking, Legal, Enginnering, Investment etc. I have not met Ndi-Okereke Onyuike, the former Director General of NSE before but I was able to stand and discuss with her. I met another woman, Professor Sophie Oluwole of Unilag African Studies Department. She is a very passionate woman about African culture and Tradition. She is a fast talker too. She talked about African professional which should be honoured too but Chief Dipo Bailey the founder corrected her that those people are vocational artisans not professional because of their low work ethics. But he agreed that an award would be created to honour the highly skilled ones among them.

Objectives of the Foundation

• Identifying the Nigerian Professionals at home and abroad who may wish to be part of the Foundation.
• Recognize and Reward professional Excellence.
• Raise a Scholarship fund to assist the young ones to study and become professionally qualified.
• Wherever possible, assist the professionally qualified to be employed
• Recognize the Builders of Professionals i.e. individuals and institutions who even though do not possess professional qualifications, but have employed a large number of professionals.
• To organize fora to seek ways of developing Nigeria Further.

So many professionals have bought into this idea and have been identifying with the Foundation. Though the rain affected the attendance because even the chairman of the Board, Chief Julius Adelusi did not come many others came. From the list of the inductees, 2 did not come too but the program went ahead and it was a success.

Chief Bailey announced to the house that come August this year when the next set of professionals will be inducted, I will be among them. I laughed because money no dey to do that now. I would love to do that but na person wey chop belle full na im dey think about Awards. Abi no be so?

I congratulate my Sole Administrator, Engineer Joseph Onobere Isah for the Award and I thank the Professional Excellence Foundation of Nigeria for honouring him. He deserves to be honoured. He has been working so hard to start production at the Plant.