[Applause]
in Nigeria we have resigned ourselves to
feeds and we have a classic response
that summarizes the depth of our
helplessness it is well equal better and
you see when we mount these platitudes
it's not as if we truly expect that
things are gonna change is that we have
accepted the abnormal it's a classic
case of land helplessness
in the late sixties and early seventies
a researcher Martin Seligman
right was conducting some some
experiments are investors vanina the
experiments on classical conditioning
some what he did was that he got some
dogs and was applying electrical charges
on them uncontrollable electrical
charges now over time the dog stopped
fighting back he'll then apply the same
uncontrollable electrical charges to
dogs that did not have that experience
and all of them were fighting back so he
was thinking he then transferred the
experiment to human beings he didn't
apply electrical charges on humanism
right
so he used loud loud noises and he
realized from that experiment that when
creatures or human beings or animals
find themselves in an uncontrollable
when they can no longer control an
outcome they stop trying that is the
origin of learned helplessness now back
to our situation we have found ourselves
in this form of learned helplessness and
because we can no longer control our
outcomes but that alone if that was just
the case of loving bear enough
but we've now seen that anytime we find
anything that remotely normal we become
paranoid and apprehensive how many of us
get worried when we have more than 48
hours of our supply have just two days
of power uninterrupted in idea you begin
to look at your life bar suspiciously
now the tragedy in this logic is that
wave contracept that if the power
holding company realizes that in their
error they have given us more than our
fair power or fair power supply they
will switch off the power and then the
power will never have electricity again
it is well is the story of learned
helplessness asserted abnormalities and
is a tragedy of Nigeria today Nyjah has
the highest number of auto school
children in the world in the whole world
world 10.5 million out-of-school
children as I December 2018 one in every
five out of school children in the world
is a Nigerian ten point five million
children can fill the 30,000 capacity
Godzilla bubble stadium Daniel Sedin 340
times over that's the number of out of
school children in idea 2d yet it is
well how many of us stood with France
when wanted one people in a sense we are
killed in this saint-denis terrorist
attack I know that a number of us recall
with terror when over 51 people were
killed in the Christchurch New Zealand
most shootings yeah
we all recall with horror we stood with
France we stood with Nestle on
but back home in our backyard in Nigeria
between October 19 2018 and March 16
2019 about 350 people we are killed by
profited headsman and bandits in just
one States it is statistic for once did
indicate success of the Federation Karen
a States according to the niger security
tracker between September 2018 and
September 2019 3027 people Nigerians we
are killed by Boko Haram alone in about
199 incidents Nigeria is submitted
maternal mortality rate is about 800
deaths for every hundred thousand live
births of the F 46 most developed
countries in the world the total but
this was in 2015 so in 2015 same 2015 of
the 46 mode most developed countries in
the world
the total maternal deaths was 1700 when
it comes to ratios that gives you about
12 maternal deaths for every hundred
thousand beds compared to Nigeria's 800
deaths for every hundred thousand live
births if you further break it down it
means that every single day about a
hundred and fifty-nine women died during
childbirth or due to pregnancy related
complications in Nigeria I want to give
us an analogy that we will take with us
a hundred and sixty people maybe a
commercial jet should be able to contain
about 160 people what what it means that
what we are doing in this country is
that every day we pack 160 pregnant
women into a commercial
yet and crash it into the ocean every
single day we crash one today
crash one tomorrow crash one next
tomorrow till we complete 365 days in a
year and we start all over again yet we
say it is well we are now the poetic
capital of the world I realized a couple
of speakers I mentioned that at ninety
four point four seven million people
living below the poverty line
we have overtaken India a country with
seven times our population as the
poverty capital of the world but is it
an interesting part of this poverty
capital team in Nigeria okay first of
all every minutes every minute in
Nigeria every minute four point five
people slide into abject poverty in
Nigeria every single minutes so if
earlier this year do about 47% of us
living in abject poverty
trust me dry by December we will have
exceeded 50 percent of our population
living in abject poverty now the
interesting thing about poverty in
Nigeria is that we actually don't
resolve ourselves to fit like that and
just go with it is well that's not
doctor team in idea was split into two
comes day is day I must blow camp and
there there is the no more free money
for looters camp
now so for the opposed block come they
are their desire to excel may make them
excel both in positive and negative ways
I mean this day's excellent is to
immigrate positive immigrate legally to
Europe negative is that you decide to go
the Sahara roots or you braved the
Mediterranean Sea so for this peaceful
we ask ourselves why do they do this but
we think that the terror of what their
past has done to them has given us a
distorted view of the future so today
people will still
Rob do all sorts of things just to
escape poverty we have so normalized
poverty we see it every day we have
accepted it that he has become part of
us the problem with that is that this
mass of impoverished people who
perceived a few successful ones as those
who have taken their rightful place in
society so the price that a successful
ones will have to pay is that every day
they and their dependents will be
singled out as a symbol of the looters
class to be kidnapped for ransom
tortured butchered and killed so it's
important that we understand how we got
here how we got to the point where we
normalize this develop abnormality for
me I had a route to Damascus moments
right and I would like to share with you
three different route to Damascus moment
that made me realize that for me to
clean my body I need to understand where
the rain began to beat me in 2011 late
2011 hours I became as appointed a
managing director and CEO of a bank in
Zambia I'm coming from the high-octane
charged nitrogen banking industry when I
go to Lusaka I thought that my
colleagues we are laid-back I felt that
they were lazy I felt that they were not
aggressive enough
it took about one more to realize that
it was me I had a problem they were
actually looking at me as if I was a
madman you know by 1600 hours which for
them is 4 p.m. everybody is thinking of
going home right by 1800 I'm still
working yeah yeah the only one walk in
and you can imagine we're in a society
like the balcony doors in there were
some people walking up
20400 which is that midnight by 1600
your staff will tell you I want to knock
off knock off is that I want to close if
you keep them you will get their summons
from the regulator or the Minister of
Labour
now so for me this was this is a small
African country and I'm wondering how
the Minister of Labour is so involved in
what you do with your stuff but I was
coming from the position of my normal
eyes of normality the second experience
was when I moved to Rwanda the deputy
managing director of a bank I was it was
in the run-up to a quarterly audits and
I was having a conversation with the
audio part now and I was trying to
explain a point to him a practice which
was very normal for me back in Nigeria
it was only when his face dropped in
bewilderment and horror that all my
education rushed back and I realized
that this thing that is almost standard
operating procedure that we have in
Nigeria can potentially be interpreted
as a fraud the third situation
Ted route to the mascots moment was when
my wife was diagnosed with stage 4
colorectal cancer prouder than any time
I was always busy any time they call me
I mean maybe I'm in the office Emily a
lot of meetings let me call you back
let me call you back and for the first
time in my life I realized that there
are some things more important than that
meeting waiter my family let me call you
back
let me call you back I realized that I
had to spend a bit more time creating
the gases than porcine the canary needs
now so yeah all of you must be wondering
where's all this headed
touch stop the average nitrogen on the
road today and ask the person the
problem in our society you realize that
that individual believes that the
problem is caused by every other person
than himself individual is never part of
the problem now in in business ethics
there's a term for it is called ethical
blindness you know when somebody's
describing a car accident and tells you
you know I was driving on my own I was
driving and I came out of nowhere and
hit me they car did not materialize out
of Tanana the car was there it was in
your blind spots you just didn't see it
so which are the problem with these
things that take time to build and we
just normalize them over time is that
after a well you no longer realize that
they're there and then one day just hit
you bump and it becomes a crisis so over
time we've had practices we have
behavioral attitudes that we have simply
normalized we think is okay and then one
day we just wake up and it becomes a
crisis so how do we change these things
what am i proposing I have a theory of
our six of excellence I mean I believe
all of us know what an oasis is so in
the desert that I read there's this
small area where you have live water etc
so regardless of what we see is
happening around you and I know it's
difficult in whatever space you find
yourself in make it an oasis of
excellence what I is in a what subgroup
what is in your family what is in your
estates the meeting in school or
university or what is even in this forum
all those practices that you have
learned over time you understand these
international best practice that I have
we go
insists that those will be the minimum
standards in the place geogrids do not
compromise on those standards and I can
tell you something it's not an easy
thing to do when I came back from Rwanda
in 2017
one of the first things I told myself
was I called a meeting of all my senior
people because there now I came back to
a bank in Nigeria and I was in charge of
the south-south or the business banking
arm so I called all my senior people and
I told them from today I want you to be
respectful when you talk to your
colleagues I want you to show empathy I
do not want to hear that you shout on
any of your colleagues I want you to
first treat them as human beings before
you don't begin to treat them as
colleagues and the only thing I want I
want you to want you to do I promise you
that this is how I'm going to relate to
you but I want you to promise me that
this is also how you are going to treat
your subordinates and that I can control
everything that's happening from my
level down because I was relatively
senior person but I cannot control the
things that happen above me but what you
have to promise me today is that those
things that are happening below you must
reflect this oasis of excellence and I
think oh I didn't stop there
I also began to engage my peers and my
superiors to tell them debate those
abnormalities that I've normalized
some cases didn't go exactly well
because they would think that you have
become less ambitious you know you have
want to water African countries you have
changed maybe there's something but
trust me that with time you realize that
the supremacy of idea ideas will prevail
it becomes easier if you are not the
only one pushing for the oasis of
excellence because the idea is that we
have several oases of excellence that at
some point will begin to connect in
concentric circles let us push create
forces of excellence everywhere we go
because ultimately those oases of
excellence who lead to a revolution of
excellence thank you
[Applause]
[Music]