Mr. Olabode Agusto, MFR Director, Agusto & Company Limited and Former Director General, Budget Office of the Federation and Chief Donald Etiebet, CON, FNCS, FNMGS (former Minister of Petroleum & Mineral Resources) will be the Guest Speaker and the Chairman respectively at this year’s 17th Annual Aret Adams Memorial lecture series slated for 25th February, 2020 at the Muson Centre (Agip Recital Hall) 8/9, Marina, Onikan, Lagos. The event will start by 11.00am prompt.
The Programs Coordinator of Aret Adams Foundation, Mr. Akin Jokojeje, said this year’s lecture which is the 17th in the series, have a theme, tagged “Nigeria’s Economy After Oil: How Prepared Are We?”
As expected, major players and stakeholders in the Oil & Gas industry, government officials, diplomats, financial institutions as well as captains of industries are expected at the event.
He said that the Foundation was established in honour of the late Chief Godwin Aret Adams. Aret Adams was a bold and visionary leader; the 2nd Managing Director the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its first Group Managing Director (1988 to 1990), who with unparalleled initiatives, drove growth and development, expanding the frontiers of oil and gas exploration, natural gas utilization and the petrochemical industry in Nigeria. In 1990 he was retired from NNPC, but was later re-appointed in 1998 as Special Adviser on Petroleum Resources to former Head of State, Federal Republic of Nigeria, Gen. Abdulsalam Abubakar (rtd).
The Foundation, Mr. Jokojeje said is aimed at promoting and building educational capacity and policy formulations. He disclosed that the National Energy policy delivered to the Federal government in April 1980 was formulated by the late Aret Adams and that it was him that re-energized negotiations that led to the successful execution of shareholders agreements for the execution of the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) project in 1989 and many others.
He went further to reveal that the Foundation has institutionalized the Aret Adams Professorial Chairs at the University of Port Harcourt in collaboration with Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC).
In addition, the Late Chief Aret Adams was a Geologist per excellence during his life time and an alumnus of the University of Ibadan. This has propelled the Foundation to be giving scholarship awards to the best selected Post Graduate students in Geology of the University of Ibadan on yearly basis to assist them in the pursuit of their M.sc degree programmes.
Also giving an insight into the forthcoming annual lecture, the Chairman, Board of Trustees of the Foundation, Engr, Charles Osezua OON, KSG noted that Chief Aret Adams left behind legacy of excellence and transparency in government transactions, development through market growth, good business value, free market competition and many more, which have reflected in many lives he touched, irrespective of tribe or religion affiliations while he was alive. It was these sterling virtues and ideals that motivated few colleagues and associates of him to establish the Foundation in 2003 to propagate and sustain the life-long dreams of the late Godwin Aret Adams”.
The BOT Chairman also revealed that the long proposed Aret Adams Professorial Chair in Business Entrepreneurial Development in Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma, Edo State and that of Geological Studies at the University of Ibadan, Oyo State will be established and inaugurated this year. He further stated that the topic for this year’s lecture is aimed at sensitizing the government as well as all stakeholders in oil & gas sector to begin to look beyond oil and gas explorations as a major source of revenue to the government. According to him, there is an urgent need for the government to begin to develop other sectors to shore-up revenue generation for the government.
One of the major highlights of this year’s lecture would be the presentation of scholarship awards to another set of Post Graduate students in Geology of the University of Ibadan.
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