Chairman, Selection Committee of the Prize, Chief Emeka Anyaoku has praised former Minister of Agriculture and current President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwumi Adesina for his commitment to the positive transformation of the African continent.
Anyaoku, made this known at a press conference, which took place at Gbagada, Lagos, and attended by other members of the community, including Chief Ayo Adebanjo, Ambassador Tokunbo Awolowo-Dosumu, Chief Lai Ogunbanji, Prof. Sat Obiyan, Prof. Banji Oyeyinka, Dr. Dele Seteolu, among others.
Anyaoku announced Adesina as the winner of the Leadership Prize for 2023, and said Adesina emerged from among numerous distinguished personalities across the globe and submitted before the committee, after a careful, detailed and rigorous screening process.
This was just as he recalled that was a direct outcome of the Special Dialogue held in July 2011 and themed, ‘Transformational Leadership and Good Governance: Lessons from the Awolọwọ Example’, saying that the dialogue highlighted the fact that one of the greatest challenges facing African countries was the dearth of good leadership, and consequently “recommended that the Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Foundation should institute an Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Prize for Leadership to encourage, recognize, reward and celebrate excellence in leadership.”
He said the prize award, which is the fourth in the series,” not only confers considerable honour and recognition on the recipient but also serves as a strong incentive to other persons to pursue excellence in leadership and good governance.
“After a careful, detailed and rigorous screening process, the Selection Committee was unanimous in deciding the recipient of this year’s Prize. I have great pleasure in informing you that the considered view of the Selection Committee is that of all the nominees presented before it, the person adjudged to possess the attributes for the award to the highest degree and therefore is the recipient of the 2023 Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Prize for Leadership is Dr. Akinwunmi Ayọdeji Adeṣina, CON, President of the African Development Bank.
“Dr. Adeṣina, a former Nigerian Minister of Agriculture in the administration of President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, is currently serving a second term as President of the African Development Bank.
“Besides being a Pan Africanist with an enthusiastic commitment to the positive transformation of the continent, he has demonstrated core leadership qualities that have been associated with Chief Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ, and which this Prize is meant to encourage and reward. Besides his manifest intellectual leadership, Dr. Adeṣina is a person whose outstanding leadership has occasioned public policies that have positively transformed millions of lives.
“As Minister of Agriculture in Nigeria, Dr. Adeṣina introduced innovative reforms such as the fertilizer sector reforms, which virtually eliminated corruption in the sector and ensured that farmers actually benefitted from the government’s subsidised fertilizers. He developed an electronic wallet system that allowed farmers to receive electronic vouchers for seeds and fertilizers directly on their mobile phones, thereby cutting off the middlemen in the system. Not less than 15 million farmers benefitted from this scheme within four years,” he added.
Giving further background of the Leadership Prize, Anyaoku, also a former Secretary General of the Commonwealth, said that the Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Prize for Leadership is an initiative of the Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Foundation, which was set up in April 1992 to serve as the custodian of Chief Awolọwọ’s intellectual and leadership legacy.
According to the elder statesman, the Foundation was established as an independent, non-profit, non-partisan organisation dedicated to immortalising the democratic and development-oriented ideals of the sage, Chief Awolọwọ, recalling that it had sought, over the years, to pursue its mission through various activities.
He listed the activities to include the periodic hosting of Dialogues designed to examine critical issues of national concern with a view to proposing viable alternative strategies for their solution.
“The institution of the Prize is a direct outcome of the Special Dialogue held in July 2011 and themed, ‘Transformational Leadership and Good Governance: Lessons from the Awolọwọ Example’. The dialogue highlighted the fact that one of the greatest challenges facing African countries is the dearth of good leadership. It, therefore, recommended that the Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Foundation should institute an Ọbafẹmi Awolọwọ Prize for Leadership to encourage, recognize, reward and celebrate excellence in leadership,” Anyaoku said.
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