Foremost technocrat and boardroom Czar, Deacon Gamaliel
Onosode, 82, is dead.
Vanguard learnt Mr. Onosode died Tuesday morning at Gold
Cross Hospital, Ikoyi Lagos at about 8:15am after a protracted illness.
Onosode was flown home yesterday from London.
According to Wikipedia:
Gamaliel Offoritsenere Onosode (born 22 May 1933) (Died 29
September 2015) is a Nigerian technocrat, administrator and a former
presidential candidate of the All Nigeria People’s Party of Nigeria. Educated
at the Government College, Ughelli and the University of Ibadan, he emerged in
the 1970s, as one of Nigeria’s leading educated chief executives, when he was
at the helm of NAL merchant bank of Nigeria. Over the years, he has risen to
become a leading boardroom player in Nigeria’s corporate environment. He was
also a former presidential adviser to President Shagari and a former president
of the Nigerian Institute of Management.
Life and career
An Urhobo man, born and raised in Sapele , a suburban city
in the current Delta State by a disciplined father, he sometimes credited the
strict family background and practice as being a complementary factor in his
success as a disciplined civil servant and corporate administrator.
Throughout his career, Dr. Gamaliel Onosode has chaired
several private and public sector businesses and initiatives. He was the
Chairman of Dunlop Nigeria Plc (1984–2007), a former chairman of Cadbury
Nigeria Plc (1977–93), the Presidential Commission on Parastatals (1981),
Nigeria LNG Working Committee and Nigeria LNG Limited (1985–90) and the Niger
Delta Environmental Survey (since 1995). He is also the Chairman of Zain
Nigeria, a GSM telecommunications company, the oldestGSM operator in Nigeria.
Mr. Gamaliel Onosode
was Presidential Adviser on Budget Affairs and Director of Budget (1983). He is
a Fellow of the Economic Development Institute of the World Bank, the Nigerian
Institute of Management, of which he was President (1979–82). He is also a
Fellow of The Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria, having been elected to
membership of its Board of Fellows in 1998.
In addition, Mr. Onosode is immediate past and inaugural
President of the Chartered Institute of Stockbrokers, immediate past
Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council of the University of Uyo
and immediate past and inaugural President & Chairman of Council of the
Association of Pension Funds of Nigeria. He is an Honorary Fellow of the
Nigerian Academy of Letters and holds Honorary D.Sc. degrees of Obafemi Awolowo
University (1990), the University of Benin (1995), and theRivers State
University of Science and Technology (2003) as well as Honorary D.D. degree of
The Nigerian Baptist Theological Seminary, Ogbomoso (2002).
In 1995, he became the Chairman of the Niger Delta
Environmental Survey, a non-governmental organisation that conducted scientific
studies on environmental and social impact assessment of oil exploration in the
Niger delta. The survey was partly financed by Shell. The survey reports which
apportioned responsibilities and blame for much of the environmental
degradation in the region on oil operators, the federal government and
communities has not been made public.
Deacon Onosode is an alumnus of the University of Ibadan,
and has contributed immense time to see through philanthropic and governing
matters concerning the university. He is the former Pro-Chancellor of the
University and Chairman of its Governing Council.
He is also a devout Christian and started Good News Baptist
Church in his Sitting Room on 1 Feb.1984. Good News Baptist Church is now a
large church of over 2000 people and has become a force to reckon with in the
Nigerian Baptist Convention in terms of missions and evangelism. Mr. Gamaliel
Onosode was the inaugural Chairman of the Global Missions Board of the Nigerian
Baptist Convention.
In addition, Onosode is Chairman of the Governing Council of
the Nigerian Baptist Theological Seminary, Ogbomoso, Nigeria’s oldest degree
awarding theological institution, which in 2008 marked 110 years of its
existence while the University of Ibadan was 60 years old.
Courtesy: Vanguard
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