Emeka Okwuosa, a 1982 Electrical and Electronics Engineering graduate of the University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University), has worked so hard to carve a niche for himself in the oil and gas industry. MARY OGEDENGBE dissects a zestful entrepreneur…
Emeka Okwuosa
His name may not, to borrow a cliche, ring a bell outside of the exclusive oil and gas industry. That in itself is an irony and one of the things that define him as an enigma because even those that have achieved a fraction of what he has achieved paint the town red and are celebrated as high-end achievers.
He is simply not loud. But not being loud is by choice, the consequence of a deep-rooted philosophy of life that defines enjoyment and happiness in very personal, even delicate, terms.
Asked how he relaxes, he waxes philosophical: “While we have preconceived notion about how life should work, ultimately it is really an individual thing.
“My own idea of enjoyment is what gives me happiness. My ability to develop things and make a difference is enjoyment for me. I have a family, and when I am with my family, I am happy. I like to develop young kids in terms of backing up their education. I like to develop people. I like to see people go from nothing to something. If I am part of such a process, it gives me happiness.”
But he is not a recluse either. “I do have friends too with whom I relax from time to time.”
But ultimately, for him, relaxation has more intrinsic value. “My own idea of relaxation is being happy at seeing that what I am doing is working out well, empowering people, consistently changing my world a bit at a time.”
But in the oil and gas industry, Emeka Okwuosa looms large. Industry watchers call him “Mr Local Content”, and that is for a reason. He bestrides the hydrocarbon industry like a colossus with over 30 years’ experience in such highly technical areas such as seismic acquisition, processing, drilling, and project management. And these experiences were garnered in over 16 countries in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Gulf of Guinea.
By the time he decided to become an entrepreneur himself and an employer of labour in the industry, he had definitely learnt the ropes. Today, he sits atop the board of such industry giants as Oilserve Limited, a pipeline/facilities engineering, procurement and construction company that has operated with distinction in the Niger Delta; Frazimex Energy Services Limited, the first indigenous company to own and operate swamp drilling rigs in the country; Frazimex Engineering Limited, an engineering design company; and Frazimex Limited, an ISO 9001:2008 certified company that owns and operates Block SL-3, offshore Sierra Leone.
When he decided to go into the oil and gas industry as an entrepreneur, it was almost an exclusive preserve of multinational oil companies like Shell, Chevron, Agip and others. For daring, he conquered, but as the foremost apostle of local content in the industry, he insists that Nigerians are not yet there.
He calls for more local presence, and this all-consuming passion makes him view even what others see as a problem from the prism of opportunities. For instance, he does not fret that the international oil companies (IOCs) are divesting. “The bottom-line,” he insists, “is that it presents good opportunities for Nigerians to come in and invest and be able to take ownership.
“I am talking about private ownership in tune and in line with international best practices. At the end of the day, if the divestment is handled prudently and properly, and the process managed very well, it will definitely portend well for Nigeria.”
But for this to happen, the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), which he describes as a “regime of law that will govern how the oil and gas industry will run in the long term” must be passed into law by the National Assembly.
If this is not done and quickly too, he predicts doom for the industry.
“In fact, if Nigeria does not move quickly and overcome the lethargy in the process of passing this PIB, the oil and gas industry will die, and I use the word ‘die’ because it is already slowing down, as investment is not going on the way it is supposed to go.”
Coming from such an optimistic entrepreneur and die-hard nationalist, it is a rather strong verdict.
But Okwuosa insists that his assertion is the product of a deep analysis of the industry. “What is important is that the PIB is actually an overhaul of the entire framework of the regime of running the petroleum industry in Nigeria. It is a very crucial bill and it is all-encompassing. It will cover some of what is going on now. What it will eventually achieve is that it will allow Nigeria have more value as a country. It will also offer the opportunity for us to domicile services and ownership in a structured manner over time.”
Though he does not think that passage of the PIB into law will solve all the problems in the oil industry, he is of the opinion that it is the most effective route to travel.
“I believe,” he says “that if we are able to pass a representative PIB law and implement it to the letter, it will take care of most of these issues.”
For Okwuosa, it is a shame that Nigeria, the sixth largest producer of crude oil globally, is a net importer of refined petroleum products.
“If you are producing crude oil, it makes sense for you to refine it,” he says matter-of-factly.
Frowning, he continues: “Beyond that simple fact is that it doesn’t make sense either, to produce crude oil and buy refined products abroad.”
It doesn’t make sense, to him, because, “When you refine crude oil in-country, you are self-sufficient, as it gives you another level of security of existence as a country. It creates a lot of jobs because the more you create services in the country, the more you employ people, the more you also give opportunities for businesses to spin off from it and have trickle-down effect.”
When this is not done, then the reverse obviously becomes the case. You are not only providing jobs for citizens of other countries, you are not also sure of the quality of refined products you are bringing back to the country, he says.
This, of course, is not rocket science. So, why is the government not mindful of these basic facts? He shrugs. “Bad management of our petroleum resources,” he says blandly.
To reverse this anomalous state of affairs in the Nigerian oil industry, Okwuosa says the country must re-invent its capacity to refine products. The only way this can be done is to ensure that the refineries are up and running. But he quickly puts a caveat: Refineries must be run by the private sector.
Why? He inclines his head to the left while opening his arms as if to say the answer should be obvious to any discerning mind. “Nigerian government has no business running refineries. Refinery business is a business on its own; governments do not run such businesses. It was good at the initial stage for government to kick-start such investments and be able to build capacity; but by a decade, government should have divested. Nigerian government – or any government for that matter – has no capacity to run refineries.”
Okwuosa’s optimism that Nigerians can become dominant players in the oil and gas industry is infectious. He calls himself an apostle of hard work and good process, the two things needed for success. Of course, he puts his money where his mouth is. So, he does not only encourage Nigerians to invest in the industry, he is a major player.
For his pioneering role, hard work and tenacity, he not only has name recognition in the elitist industry, he has also made some fortune.
But for him, business should not be a winner-takes-all affair; it should be a win-win situation, particularly in the oil industry. Host communities must benefit, no matter how tangentially, from the success of the entrepreneur. Of course, that is being socially responsible as an organisation. He does all that and more.
Okwuosa is a philanthropist. His idea of success is not measured only in terms of how much is in the bank account, but how positively it rubs off on humanity.
He puts it more succinctly: “If you are successful at what you do and you thump your chest and say ‘I have achieved a lot’ and you smile and look at what you have achieved, you are missing the point. What is more important here is how you impact positively on people around you to make them better people and also be able to drive a system that is sustainable.”
That encapsulates the essence of the man his contemporaries call Mr Local Content, the trail blazer.
