We've Got a Great Leader Here
By Maureen Chigbo
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Shehu Ladan, group executive director, Commercial and Investment, speaks to Maureen Chigbo, general editor, on the leadership style of Abubakar Yar’Adua, the acting group managing director of NNPC, who clocked one year in office August 14. Excerpts:
Newswatch: How would you assess the leadership of Abubakar Yar’Adua in the last one year?
Ladan: We are glad to celebrate this one year with Engineer Yar’Adua at the helm of affairs here in NNPC. He is a person who is very passionate about the activities of NNPC and he goes out of his way to ensure that the corporation lives up to expectation. You can see that for the first time in a very long time, all the refineries are working. And that is thanks to his vibrant leadership. He is also very much interested in the welfare of the staff. Infact, anywhere he goes they call him "comrade." And he doesn’t mince words in expressing solidarity with workers. That is the greatest asset we have. Apart from technology, the next asset is the human being because no matter how good your technology, how good your equipment are, they can only be as good as the human beings you have in place. And, therefore, the welfare of the staff is paramount and uppermost in his mind. He gives that kind of leadership. And within that one year of his leadership, you can see that we have recorded relative peace in the industry, no strike either in the NNPC or even the wider PENGASSAN AND NUPENG because he has been able to hold them in check due to his kind of leadership. And like I said earlier on, all the refineries are now working. And you know he is a very experienced refiner. He has seen all the refineries under him. So he is a very experienced man. He has brought that to bear on his present job. And we can only wish him well and continue to support him.
Newswatch: What do you think are the major challenges he has had since he assumed office?
Ladan: It’s just like all other GMDs before him. The major difficulties were really how to contend with the prices of petroleum products because on one hand, NNPC buys the crude oil which we send to the refineries for refining at international price. We pay the international price. But when we import or produce, the refineries are not permitted to sell at the commercial rate where we can recoup our investment. So that is one of the major problems. That is cash flow as it were. And secondly, our ability to replace all the equipment. You know it takes time to source for fund and to get all approvals in place. To my mind, these are the major problems any group managing director will face. But whatever he faces now as an individual group managing director, I think he will be in a better position to say. But as group executive director working with him, these are the normal open problems which he has been grappling with.
Newswatch: Which areas do you think need improvement?
Ladan: Well, it is the refineries, to ensure that all the units are working. And attention should also be paid to the pipelines because these are the lifewire of NNPC. Once the refineries are not working, NNPC is not good in the eyes of the public. And once we are producing and the pipelines are not in shape it means we cannot evacuate and you will have shortages. These are the two areas and we continue to give attention to it.
Don’t forget that it is a collective responsibility. If he succeeds, it is a collective success, if he fails, it is collective failure. So, he is not a sole administrator. So all the decision he takes, he takes on the basis of consulting with all of us. So he is the leader. He gives us the leadership. It is not a question of advising him. We are working with him and we are the ones to advise him on how to succeed.
Newswatch: What is his leadership style like?
Ladan: His leadership style is very open. Any problem that comes up he calls all the directors and at one minute notice we discuss and we take decisions there and then. And he forgets about it. He doesn’t keep malice. He doesn’t hide his feelings. And so he has a leadership style that is open.
|
