My
dream is to become an accomplished industrialist
By PRECIOUS NJOKU
Monday, October 9, 2006
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• Soboyejo
Photo: The Sun News Publishing |
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At any point in time, Honourable Mrs Josephine Soboyejo always
has so many irons in the fire business-wise. Recently, the
one-time chairman of SMEs, Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry,
and managing director of Shedicas Company Limited, has had
some of her businesses collapsing because she left them in
the hands of other people, while she was deeply involved in
politics. However, she had left an indelible footprint in
the sectors where she had played.
In this exclusive interview with Daily Sun,
the former member of the House of Representatives and member,
Board of Governors, National Institute, Kuru, near Jos, looks
at her foray into business, the challenges facing Nigerian
businesswomen and the problems encountered by entrepreneurs
in trying to access the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)
loan. Excerpts:
Background
My name is Hon. (Mrs) Josephine Olatomi Soboyejo. During the
Second Republic under the President Shehu Shagari government,
I was duly elected a member of the Federal House of Representatives,
representing Ikeja Federal Constituency. I am from Ogun State,
but I was born in Lagos and also grew up in Lagos. I read
Science Technology at Yaba College of Technology, but majored
in Biochemistry. I started work with Sterling Products, which
was bought over by Beecham.
I left there to be a pioneer quality control manager for Continental
Pharmaceuticals. My working mandate then was quality control,
that is, quality assurance of pharmaceutical products, right
from the raw materials to intermediate products to the finished
products.
I wish we had people like Dora Akunyili then, but I will say
I was like her because I would insist till the products meet
the specifications. I left that for politics.
Going into business
Actually, I had been in business, but I registered my company
in 1984. My business name was an acronym of what I intended
to do then. The company’s name is Shedicas Company Limited,
which was into science, hospital equipment, drugs, industrial
chemical and supermarket. These were the businesses I was
involved in then. I had a big pharmacy and a big supermarket
in Ikeja and I had so many staffers working for me.
Even though, we, the small and medium enterprises, cry that
we do not have money, you still find out that it is very hard
to see an honest and diligent staffer and if you are not careful,
you end up regretting. Recently, I had to close down a cyber
café worth over N5 million. It was a kind of partnership
between me and a classmate of mine because I had no time to
supervise it. I was busy in politics, deeply involved in Otunba
Daniels politics, I was there in Ogun State, busy travelling
and thinking I was dealing with somebody I could trust and
at the end over N5 million went down the drain because of
a technical problem.
I was also into Information Technology as far back as 1990.
I was one of the first people who started IT training in this
country. I have the technical knowledge of IT and Internet.
I have been training people on Internet; I taught some of
the people in FAAN, in the federal civil aviation, I trained
all their technologists and engineers. I used to run a computer
school; I trained so many desktop publishers, who today are
either working in newspapers or operating their business centres.
A lot of people have passed through me, but you see because
I have not been able to stay in that business everything has
gone down the drain. I just discovered that you couldn’t
entrust anybody with everything in business.
The only business of mine I have been able to sustain is the
DHL franchise because DHL has its own backup. They have everything.
Over the years they have perfected plan where people cannot
just defraud the company. This has made it easy that when
I go there, it is just to access what the customer service
is doing. Aside that, I am also a publisher, I have authored
so many books.
Motivation
Like I’ve said, my business was science, hospital equipment,
and drugs. In 1987, I had an arrangement with a company in
UK, they call it Contract Company. So, I went to the UK and
brought Ampiclox 250mg and so many other drugs. Unfortunately,
when I came back from London, I discovered that I could not
sell the drug at my cost price because I was owing a big pharmaceutical
company and I discovered we have some unpatriotic Nigerians
who had gone to the Far East and brought in a lot of fake
Ampiclox, claiming it was 250mg, while some of them just put
chalk inside and were selling them as Ampicilin and the fake
product flooded the market.
Initially, I said let me wait a little before selling mine
but these unpatriotic Nigerians flooded the market with the
product and even with expired drugs. They have a way of rubbing
off the expiry date and I just could not sell mine and I kept
on keeping it and when it was close to the expiring date,
I decided to sell it off and that was a very big set back
and I made a very big loss.
So, I found out I could not compete with all these unpatriotic
Nigerians when it comes to pharmaceuticals any more because
I wanted to be a good Christian that will give people real
drugs and not fake. I didn’t want to sell those ones
that are expired, so, I found out I could not compete and
I had to drop the business.
Also, when my supermarket was broken into by robbers who made
away with every expensive item, making me to run into loss,
I said enough is enough.
Then I was not thinking of courier business, but my husband
came back that day and said I have somebody in DHL office
and it looks as if they are looking for someone to operate
an office in Medical Road, then it was not called Computer
Village.
My husband suggested that I apply, saying they might give
me a sort of independent agency, as DHL then had no independent
agency. So, I was one of the very first they had in Lagos
State. However, then I was into the distribution of gas. I
refill cylinders and people buy filled ones and then computer
was new and my brother-in-law who read Theatre Arts went into
computer and advised that I go into it too.
So, in 1990, I diversified into IT and DHL franchise, and
went to Britain and bought a lot of fairly used computer system
with which I started my institute.
Initial capital
Do not forget I was a member of the Federal House of Representatives
then. So, when the military took over, on my personal recognition,
I took a loan from the United Bank for Africa (UBA).
Problems in accessing the banks equity fund
I can talk a lot about this, although I did not try to access
that fund. But for about the two years I was the chairman
of SMEs for Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, many of
my members tried to access the SME fund. In fact, I took it
upon myself to sensitise the media on the disadvantages of
SMEs and the inability of members to access the fund.
The kind of thing that is affecting them is the samething
that happened to the N50 billion meant for farmers. So, many
things were wrong in the requirements of SMEs, that you must
have land or capital of N200 million then and you find out
that 99 per cent of our people do not have that and it affected
the SMEs.
Also the conditions, I am not saying they are bad or wrong,
but they do not favour those we regard as SMEs and that is
why we are advocating 10 per cent for micro as the economy
of Nigeria has been dealt with to the extent that the hitherto
big businesses have become medium, medium has become small,
small has become micro, and micro has also become cottage.
Let me use myself as an example, when I started my business,
I had 25 workers and the strength is now reduced to five.
So, you find out that it is not easy to access the fund because
before you can access the fund, there is a minimum number
of staff you are expected to have. So, the majority of them
do not have the number of staff and so could not access the
fund. And banks too are not interested in small businesses.
Most of them do not have somebody who will represent them
at the board level. Some of them who were able to access it
still run into problem.
The equity participation is 60 and 40 per cent but in this
case they said 70 to 30, the man accepted 30 per cent just
to access the fund and at the end he is complaining that the
bank wanted to take over his business. So, you discover that
at end of it all they complain. If you cannot access up to
N50 million, they do not have time for you, but all these
SMEs need small money as from N1 million to N10 million and
they are not given that opportunity.
My courier and IT business
You know I am not the founder of DHL, so may not know all
the challenges. But our cash sales for now have been a little
bit low. This is owing to the improvement in postal agencies
now because before they were ineffective, and DHL made a lot
of cash because people preferred our services to any other
and we have not failed them in any way, we have been very
effective.
In courier business, the challenges are there. There is a
certain target you have to meet and my target as at today
has not been met. I am N1 million plus below my target and
I pray God will see me through.
In IT, you know it is a very wide area, so it depends on where
you are focusing. There are so many areas like software, hardware,
and teaching of computer. And because it is so wide, the business
has not reached its potentials in Nigeria. So, anyone who
goes into IT, no matter the aspect, will not regret it, even
with the GSM telecom unifications going with it, I can only
say you go into the one that you have technical expertise
and make sure you do not rely on people, go into what you
know how to do best.
As for the courier business, it is still the safest way to
deliver messages or packages. As EFCC is fighting corruption,
so is DHL. DHL has put in efforts to make sure those 419ners
do not have their way. Like in cheque, DHL does not deliver
cheque, for them to deliver it, they have to know you very
well and trust you. DHL do not courier any document that is
not genuine.
Lucrative
Like I told you, if you go into IT, you will not regret it,
no matter which aspect of it you went into. For courier, we
were making money before, because there were no Internet facilities
and the postal agencies were ineffective then, so the only
means left to deliver messages or packages was only DHL and
they are the people you can trust their services. Before,
DHL was the first courier, but now they are many. We have
Red Star, TNT, among others and so they are competing among
themselves.
So, when I first came to Ikeja, we were making a lot of money,
but now it is not like that, the market has been cut down
a little with so many other things coming up.
Being a housewife
God has made me a very talented woman and I found out over
the years that there is nowhere I found myself, no matter
the discipline,that I will not excel. Although, it is not
by my power, but by the spirit of God. I find out that my
man who married me knew the kind of woman I was before the
marriage. I can combine four things together and will not
be lagging behind in any. I call it coordination, when you
are highly coordinated, focused and gifted, you can combine
all. I thank God I have good health, I rarely get sick. I
am not the lazy type. In fact, for your information, when
I was in the Federal House of Representatives, I was pregnant
for my last-born who is now 22 years plus and I was very active.
Dream
Every businesswoman’s dream is to be an accomplished
industrialist or businessperson who will reach the peak. And
also to be able to create wealth, not for myself alone, but
also for other people. But, I have not been able to achieve
all I wanted and I pray to God to be able to affect the lives
of the common people. Basically, my aim is to serve God and
humanity. Even in business, I regard service to humanity as
the ultimate thing. I want to better the lives of people who
are unemployed and I wish the economy would improve so that
we can get fund to be able to establish, employ and affect
people’s lives positively.
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