It was Prof. Femi Osofisan, an acclaimed literary giant, who aptly titled one of his award-winning plays, “Birthdays Are Not For Dying”. Indeed, birthdays are supposed to be occasions for the celebration of life by the living. A birthday is also a period when the celebrant takes stock of his or her life and feels like climbing the mountain top to shout Halleluiah. Undoubtedly, if there is any human being who is currently experiencing the proverbial Seventh Heaven, typical of a woman who has just safely been delivered of a baby, it is no other than Tony Elumelu, the quintessential banker.
As this financial wizard recently hit the ripe age of 52, not a few are willing to share in his joy. The reason is that the ‘birthday boy’ has become “so well known, so popular, so celebrated, so famous, that it permits him “to break wind in society/financial, and society/financial would think it’s a most natural thing.” Little wonder the crème de la crème of Nigeria’s high society/financial sector were on hand to celebrate him as he marks his on Sunday 22nd March.
Elumelu, as gathered by this medium, had shown traces of precocity very early in life. Though he may not be said to be clairvoyant, his childhood betrayed him as a potentially great person in life. As a child, his dream was to become one of the greatest economists and bankers in the world. Luckily, providence has granted him his heart’s desire.
At 34, he set forth on the path to greatness when he led a small group of investors to acquire Standard Trust Bank, a then small struggling commercial bank in Lagos, and restored it to profitability within a few years. Again, he became a reference point around the globe in 2005 when he led one of the greatest mergers in the history of African banking sector – the merger of Standard Trust Bank (STB) and United Bank of Africa (UBA). Consequently, at the world’s major stock markets such as NASDAQ OMX in New York, London Stock Exchange, Abuja Securities and commodities Exchange, JSE Limited, Nigerian Stock Exchange and many others, his name rings so loud. Within five years, he transformed the bank to be one of the best financial institutions in the world.
Evidently, the Delta State-born financial guru is powerful. Little wonder, he was rated one of the most influential in Africa as well as one of the 2014 Forbes richest men in Africa with net worth of $1billion. He is reputed to have injected lifeblood into the African economy through what he termed ‘Africapitalism’, an economic philosophy that embodies the private sector’s commitment to the economic transformation of African through long-term investments that create both economic prosperity and social wealth. It is public knowledge that his company, Heirs Holdings, that was set up after leaving the UBA in 2010 is involved in every sector of the economy all over the continent. We learnt that many African leaders have his number of their telephone lists and regularly consult him before taking major economic decision because they consider his experience invaluable.
A philanthropist per excellence, Elumelu, set up the Tony Elumelu Foundation. The vision, according to him, was “to prove that the African private sector can itself be the primary generator of economic development. The Foundation is charged with the mission of driving Africa’s economic development by enhancing the competitiveness of the African private sector. As a premier pan-African focused not-for-profit institution, the Foundation is dedicated to the promotion and celebration of entrepreneurship and excellence in business leadership across the continent.”