News
Abdulhameed: Global Recognition for Passionate Agribusiness Technocrat
By Cletus Adole
“A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way”. —John Maxwell
The recent announcement that Mr Aliyu Abdulhameed, MD/CEO of the Nigerian Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL PLC), is a winner of the prestigious Global Award of the CEO Today Magazine for 2021 will not surprise anyone familiar with the contributions which the man and the organization he leads are have made to the transformation of Nigerian agriculture and agribusiness over the past five years.
Mr Aliyu Abdulhameed, MD/CEO, NIRSAL PLC
As a result of the dynamic and innovative leadership of NIRSAL PLC under Abdulhameed’s watch, the young institution which was barely a blip on the radar five years ago has become a robust and respected presence with solid and measurable accomplishments making real impact at various levels of the agro-economy.
According to CEO Today, Abdulhameed, a highly experienced agricultural economist with over 30 years hands-on experience in agricultural value chains and markets in sub-Sahara Africa is deserving of recognition on account of the innovations and accomplishments that NIRSAL PLC has notched up under his leadership.
The evidence of the impact he is making is unimpeachable, starting from NIRSAL PLC’s core mandate of making agriculture more attractive to banks and encouraging more investment in the sector.
Among NIRSAL’s achievements under Abdulhameed’s watch is the facilitation of over $550 million to various actors across Agricultural Value Chains for mechanization activities, input distribution, and the production, processing, trading and marketing of agricultural commodities.
Related to this, commercial banks have pledged to provide an additional $500 million to fund agriculture in the short to medium-term based on their faith in NIRSAL PLC’s Credit Risk Guarantee (CRG) and structured Agro Geo-Cooperatives®.
It is an indication that financiers are growing more and more confident in lending to agriculture. This claim is supported by the remarkable growth in the rate of bank lending to agriculture, from 1.4% pre-NIRSAL to 4.8 per cent as of Q3 2020.
The CEO Today Magazine Award has been won by a select group of outstanding achievers on different continents over the years. It recognizes “strong and innovative leadership among the most inspiring CEOs and business leaders” across the world.
The highly regarded platform honours the most-respected companies and their C-Level executives who lead the way for others on a global stage.
According to the magazine, the 2021 awards are special because the CEOs selected, delivered despite the Coronavirus pandemic.
The 2021 award winners come from the academia, tech, e-commerce, public administration and more from several countries including the UAE, Germany, USA, Sweden, Bulgaria and China. The include:
Dr Abdullatif Al Shamsi, President and CEO of the Higher Colleges of Technology, the largest higher institution in the United Arab Emirates with 23,000 students across 16 campuses;
Michael Lampel, CEO and Founder of Qooper Media, an accomplished investor and business development expert based in south west Germany;
Philip Weiser, CEO of AnyDesk, an innovative remote solutions company in Germany which has witnessed impressive growth while disrupting the remote software solutions industry since the pandemic
As those who know him can attest, Abdulhameed is the kind of leader who is comfortable at all points of the leadership spectrum.
He is both a visionary passionate both about the big issues at the critical junction of agriculture and agribusiness as well as a hands-on technocrat who likes to immerse himself in the nitty-gritty details of small scale farming.
This passion shines through whether he is on the podium at a conference, marshaling his troops in the office to reach targets or on a field trip to inspect an agricultural project supported by NIRSAL PLC.
Always bustling with energy and big ideas, he is always focused on one priority whether he is discussing the latest technologies and techniques in global agriculture or the best methods to organize the millions of poor farmers for higher productivity: better results.
The award for innovative leadership is therefore well deserved because, at NIRSAL PLC, Abdulhameed is showcasing skills and experience spanning across a wide range of areas including, agricultural value chain development, agricultural value chain finance, research and innovation, extension services, agribusiness development, product marketing, strategy, project management as well as agricultural policy analysis and advocacy.
The passionate agribusiness manager and thought leader is fond of saying that NIRSAL PLC has “innovation in its DNA”. This is clear from the raft of innovations he is leading in the organization such as the creation of NIRSAL Agro Geo-Cooperative® (AGC) scheme, an ambitious, paradigmatic plan targeted at revolutionizing agricultural production and productivity in the country.
The scheme is structuring farmers and aggregating their farmlands into contiguous stretches of 250 hectares each and link them with training, inputs, mechanization, financing and produce buyers.
AGC will build on the increasing benefits of NIRSAL initiatives that are making a real difference in creating opportunities for farmers. So far, through NIRSAL’s facilitation, more than 370,000 direct jobs have been created and an estimated 1.8 million indirect jobs in the pre-upstream, upstream, midstream and downstream segments of the agricultural value chain, specifically in the areas of mechanization, input supply, primary production and processing.
Other innovations being progressed under Abdulhameed’s watch include the creation and mapping of Agricultural Commodity Ecological Areas (ACEAs); the development of the Mapping to Markets (M2M) strategy; the development of innovative index-based agricultural insurance products; the introduction of comprehensive field monitoring by remote sensing satellite systems and granular validation by UAS platforms; and the development of the Secured Agricultural Commodity Transport & Storage Corridor (SATS-C) model to address logistical inefficiencies in the agricultural value chain in Nigeria.
This is not the first significant recognition of NIRSAL under Abdulhameed’s leadership. The institution also won the Outstanding Development Finance Institution Award of the Annual BusinessDay Banks’ And Other Financial institutions (BAFI) Awards back to back in 2018 and 2019. BAFI recognizes and celebrates outstanding performance in Nigeria’s financial services industry including those that have brought revolutionary benefits to the sector.
The CEO Today award confirms the potent blend of quality and passion that defines this remarkable man and leader.
Perhaps more important, it is a credit to the unique institution he leads and the great difference that he, along with his hardworking team are making in the executive suites of the financial sector and fields of Nigeria’s agriculture and agribusiness.
*Cletus Adole is a policy analyst based in Abuja.
Ola Olukoyede, chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), has disclosed that the commission recovered more than N7.2 million stolen from the bank account of a serving judge by suspected internet fraudsters in a midnight cyberattack.
Ola Olukoyede, Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Olukoyede made the disclosure at the public presentation of two books authored by retired High Court judge, Justice Alaba Omolaye-Ajileye.
He said the serving judge, who is from a South-South state, contacted him around 1:00 a.m. after receiving multiple debit alerts indicating that funds had been withdrawn from her account.
According to him, the stolen money represented savings the judge had accumulated over six years to finance her child’s education.
Olukoyede said the EFCC immediately swung into action and successfully recovered the entire sum before 6:00 p.m. on the same day.
He said the incident underscored the increasing sophistication of cybercriminals and the urgent need for stronger collaboration among law enforcement agencies, the judiciary and members of the public in tackling financial crimes.
The EFCC chairman also called for amendments to Nigeria’s legal framework to accommodate the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in criminal investigations and prosecutions.
According to him, existing evidence laws should be reviewed to recognise AI-generated evidence as technology continues to reshape crime detection and investigation.
Also speaking at the event, former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Chief Kanu Agabi (SAN), urged anti-corruption agencies to intensify efforts to trace and recover public funds allegedly stolen and stashed in foreign countries.
Agabi stressed the need for sustained collaboration among relevant institutions to strengthen Nigeria’s anti-corruption efforts and improve accountability in public service.
In his remarks, a former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), called for stricter enforcement of the country’s cybercrime laws to curb the growing menace of internet fraud.
Olanipekun said effective implementation of existing laws, alongside stronger institutional cooperation, would help address the increasing threat posed by cybercriminals to individuals and the nation’s financial system.
Federal Government has cleared nearly N39 billion in outstanding pension liabilities owed to retirees under the Defined Benefit Scheme (DBS), including former employees of the defunct Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL), Mobile Telecommunications Limited (MTEL), the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) and other federal government agencies.
The Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD) disclosed this in a statement, saying the payments were in line with President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda, which prioritises the settlement of inherited pension liabilities and improved welfare for retired public servants.
According to the directorate, the largest component of the payment, amounting to N25 billion, covered about 35 months of outstanding pension arrears owed to nearly 10,000 eligible retirees of the defunct NITEL and MTEL.
PTAD also said it disbursed about N9.5 billion as the first tranche of Back End Computation (BEC) arrears to eligible pensioners of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria.
The Executive Secretary of PTAD, Mrs Tolulope Odunaiya, described the payments as a significant milestone in the Federal Government’s efforts to clear inherited pension obligations and strengthen confidence in the Defined Benefit Scheme.
Odunaiya said the settlement was made possible following presidential approval granted in 2025 and funding provided under the 2026 Appropriation Act.
She noted that the intervention had enabled the directorate to resolve long-standing pension liabilities affecting thousands of retirees.
“The successful settlement reflects the Federal Government’s commitment to sustaining pension reforms and ensuring that retirees receive their entitlements promptly in line with the objectives of the Renewed Hope Agenda,” she said.
Odunaiya thanked the affected pensioners for their patience while the liabilities remained outstanding and reaffirmed PTAD’s commitment to transparent, efficient and pensioner-focused service delivery.
She added that the directorate would continue to work towards improving pension administration and ensuring timely payment of retirees’ benefits.
A Federal High Court, Lagos has declared Mrs. Ebele Okpala, a female banker with Keystone Bank, wanted over alleged N35 million fraud.
Apart from declaring the banker who is said to be outside the country wanted, Justice deinde Dipeolu, trial judge in the matter, also directed the Department of State Security (DSS), Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS), and Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), to arrest her upon arriving the country.
Justice Dipeolu made the above order while granting a motion ex-parte marked FHC/L/530C/2024, filed and moved by M. Bello, on behalf of the Nigeria Police.
In the motion, Ebele Okpala and one Perpetual Onyeto, also a banker were listed as first and second defendants/respondents in the suit, while DSS, NIS and NCS were listed as cited parties/respondents.
In urging the court to make the above orders, Bello, informed the court that the application was pursuant to several sections of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015, and under the court’s inherent jurisdiction. Adding that the application was supported by an affidavit deposed to by Inspector Tope Akerele of the Force Criminal Investigation Department (FCID), Special Fraud Unit (SFU), Ikoyi, Lagos.
In granting the application, Justice Dipeolu held, “After considering the application and the supporting affidavit, the request had merit and granted all the reliefs sought by the prosecution.
“That an order is hereby made that the 1st defendant/despondent be declared wanted and placed on the wanted list of the Nigeria Police Special Fraud Unit, 13, Milverton Road, Ikoyi, Lagos until she is arrested.
“That an order is hereby made compelling cited parties/respondents to assist in apprehending 1st defendant/Respondent once he enters into the country.
“That an order is hereby made permitting the Publication of the name of the 1st defendant/despondent in the National Daily Newspapers and Social Media handles by the Nigeria Police Special Fraud Unity Ikoyi, Lagos for the purpose of fulfilling the requirement of the Order 1 above.”
Recall that both the wanted banker and the second defendant/respondent were previously arraigned before the court by the operatives of the police Special Fraud Unit, PSFU.
Specifically, the two bankers were arraigned before the court sometimes in September 2024, on alleged conspiracy, theft, money laundering, fraudulent lift of lien placed on bank’s customer’s account and obtaining the sum of N35 million by false presence.
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