Acceptance Speech At PHARMACEUTICAL MANUFACTURERS’ GROUP MANUFACTURERS’ ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (PMG-MAN) DAY OF RECOGNITIONS

Engr S.A Opaluwah receiving his award 

I give God the glory for this event. 

I wish to most sincerely thank the leadership and members of the PMG-MAN for this award. 

I have closely interacted with the members and leadership of the PMG-MAN in the course of my duty tour at the Federal Ministry of Health where I was the Director of Procurement. I believe that this event is a consequence of that period of my public service. When I was informed of today’s event, I was very surprised in the sense that while I knew and interacted with members of PMG-MAN, defended their cause, both at home and at some international fora, I was merely doing my duty as a government official in the Health Ministry and also a patriotic Nigerian. 

You can therefore understand my surprise for being recognized for something I enjoyed doing. I am most deeply appreciative. With the advent of the Obasanjo administration on 29th May,1999, the country’s public expenditure profile came under the searchlight of international finance institutions.  Nigeria was then saddled with a huge public debt profile, both local and foreign, that stifled development and made life intolerable within our polity. 

The Man: Engr S.A Opaluwah!

Engr. Samson Ameh Opaluwah is a Construction Engineer, a Professional Builder, a Facility Manager and a Procurement Expert. Born on October 1st, 1954 at Idah in Kogi State of Nigeria, Engr. Opaluwah is married with one wife and five children{ four ladies and one man}  He is presently the Director of Procurement in the Federal Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, Abuja. 

He attended Ahmadu Bello University Zaria {1975-1978} where he obtained a BSc. first class honours degree in Building, Leeds University, England {1981-1983} and St. Clement University, West Indies between {1998- 2002} for the MSc. & PhD. degrees in Civil Engineering & Management respectively. 

He was a member of the management team at Benue Cement Company Plc. Gboko who took over the management of the company from the expatriate managers in the eighties and brought the company to the stock exchange as a blue chip investment in 1990. Engr. Opaluwah joined the Federal Public Service in 1999, in the Presidency, as the pioneer Director of Maintenance at the National Hospital Abuja where he supervised the Facilities Management of the then newly installed state-of-the-art hi-tech medical equipment, infrastructure and facilities of the apex-referral Hospital and produced the first documented Maintenance Policy in the public sector in Nigeria. 

The Chief G.Y. Aduku I Know

Arc G.Y. Aduku

I consider it a great privilege and an honour to be asked to write a brief on a person I consider as my mentor and a leading light in the Construction Industry under whom I cut my teeth professionally in 1979 as a young graduate of Building.  As is the case even today, so it was then that when the news broke that I had obtained a First Class Honours Degree in Building from the prestigious Ahmadu Bello University a lot of interest about me was generated in Igala-land. 

 It was under this circumstance that late Chief A. J. Ali who was the Chief Administrative Officer of the Anyigba Agricultural Project where I wanted to settle down and work advised me to meet Chief G. Y. Aduku for advise on my career and possible employment opportunities. I undertook the Trip to Kaduna in August 1979 and never returned to take up the offers of employment in the Benue State Government and the Anyigba Agricultural Project. 

It is pertinent to say that his influence on me which started at first sight was such that when in October of the same year, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) offered me the position of a pupil Engineer, I declined the offer and remained with Chief G. Y. Aduku in Archcon Nigeria Ltd, Kaduna.  In Archcon Nigeria Ltd, we were one family of professionals of various disciplines managing both small and large projects all over the country.