From Adetutu Folasade-Koyi And Aidoghie Paulinus, Abuja
Chairman, Kakatar Group Limited, Robert Azibaola, has said that producing the first Nigerian excavator will give him more satisfaction than making an electric car.
Azibaola, who doubles as the Chairman of Zeetin Engineering Limited, told Saturday Sun in Abuja that he is even more interested in heavy duty equipment than an electric car, noting that heavy duty equipment actually moves a nation forward.
The Bayelsa-born lawyer turned engineer, also said his foray into the field of engineering is driven by passion and love of country.
How feasible is your quest to pioneer the manufacturing of electric cars, heavy duty machines and allied machines in Nigeria?
Very feasible! Absolutely feasible! The problem of Africa and Nigeria is the problem of the fear of the unknown, inability to do things in different ways. So, we are fixated with the old ways of doing things, otherwise, every car or every movable instrument or vehicle is made up of an engine and an engine is carved.
What timelines are you looking at to give Nigeria an electric car?
This is something that takes a lot of patience and a lot of effort, including resources. At this stage, it is the resources that we are working on. Once the resources that we are expecting become available, it will not take us a few months to do it.
Why an electric car?
I am not particular about electric car. I am particular about automobiles. An electric car is part of automobile. I am even more interested in heavy duty equipment because it is the heavy duty equipment that moves a nation forward. You must move materials from one point to the other for a nation to grow and that is the basis of industrial revolution. So, if Nigeria must have an industrial revolution, we must be able to produce the equipment that move people around, move materials around and then, to the next stage. For instance, the basic idea of excavator and a bulldozer – to push laterite and load and offload laterite, you need an excavator. These are basically metals that are put together with an engine in a body. That technology is there. I would love to produce the first Nigerian excavator, wholly made in Nigeria excavator. That will even give me more satisfaction than making an electric car. But the electric car is good because the world is moving to renewable energy and it appears that Nigeria will soon be out of the electric quagmire that we are. And with the cost of petrol and diesel, people need to do electric car.
You were a lawyer before you delved into engineering. What you are going to produce, is it going to be indigenous or are you copying engineering from other places?
Everybody copies engineering and that is why you have what you called first edition, second edition and third edition. In fact, you can never buy all the editions because they keep modifying it. I am not saying I am going to copy somebody, but the basic principles of engineering are uniform across the globe.
At this point, you are deploying a lot of resources. Is it passion or business?
Passion grows business. It is passion. If you don’t have passion and love for the country, sometimes, your vision will be distorted. So, I have a vision and this vision is driven by passion. And I am not pushing to become the richest Nigerian. I am rather pushing to become the first Nigerian who invented or who produced the first automobile in Nigeria, made in Nigeria by Nigerians. That will keep me in the annals of history, longer than those who have made billions. If you are a billionaire and you die a billionaire, in five years, your name will be forgotten. But if you create something and keep that thing in the society, for instance, if I make a Nigerian engine and it becomes so popular, my name will be there for 100, 200, 300 years. It is better than making billions and dying with them.
You said something which I find curious. You said made in Nigeria by Nigerians, the first automobile. Are you telling me that Innoson doesn’t take that tag?
I have said in the past that Innoson is a great Nigerian. He has done what millions of Nigerians couldn’t do, a lot of things that have been dreamt of in Nigeria. I think that Innoson himself will respect the fact that yes, this is a different ball game – carving the engines in Nigeria. Innoson has not told us that he has made an Innoson engine. So, it is in the realm of speculation that Innoson is making automobiles. But when you say Toyota, for instance, it means that Toyota made the engine. Every other part could be made by someone else. If you say Mercedes, Mercedes makes the engine, although sometimes, they can as well sublet the engine. But it is designed by Mercedes. So, I don’t want to say that Innoson has not made automobile. What I am saying is that as it stands in Nigeria, nobody has made a Nigerian engine.
How did you come about the idea to go into this?
It has always been my passion to be a hands-on person, to make things and see things physical that I can make. I am a lawyer and by my training as a lawyer, I am supposed to be a theoretical person. But that does not give me satisfaction. It is what I am able to do with my hands that give me satisfaction. So, if there is anything that will give me joy, it is to make a physical thing that people will say oh, this is a brand made by a lawyer in Nigeria.
At what point did you switch from campaigning against environmental degradation and law practise to engineering?
The engineering part of me has been latent. It has never been something that wasn’t there. When faced with oppression, faced with injustice and faced with military dictatorship, you probably would choose to free your people from those kinds of situations than to be fully involved in engineering. So, there were these other emergencies – human right issues. They were emergencies of democracy and good governance and environmental degradation which were things that all of us, whether you are an engineer or lawyer, you would have to struggle to win before you do your normal business. So, that was what happened. When Nigeria became a democracy in 1999, I decided that let me switch to my passion.
Since you switched into this, how much have you expended on it so far?
Nobody has funded me. I have been doing this on my own and everything that I make goes into it and I can assure you that it is in billions.
You have a machine that can produce an engine. Are you not thinking about the spare parts market? You are talking about bulldozers; you are talking about excavators, how about the lower cadre, small, small built, producing spare parts?
In fact, theirs will come earlier than the engines because for the engines, while we are working on research and development of the engines, we are going to start producing a few of the spare parts, including brake pads and other things that keep the market going so that we will be able to put the profits into this other high end production. So, we will do all that. The most important thing is that this thing that I am doing has so much ripple effect on the nation that it is capable of reproducing several other industries or businesses or businessmen. No entrepreneur or no factory produces everything. You produce the main thing and allow others to supply the others. For instance, I will not be interested in the production of bolts and nuts. The market of bolts and nuts is almost saturated.
How easy is sourcing of materials?
The main thing that we will be doing, we will be using a lot of metals and metals are not readily produced in Nigeria. So, most of the metals that we might consume may come from abroad. But that is also a third party business that we are trying to do because I don’t want to keep a warehouse where I will import a lot of metals and I will be storing them. No.
In that case, is forex affecting your sourcing for materials abroad? How does Zeetin navigate that?
The only difference forex will do is that the imported products might at the beginning be cheaper than the products that we will produce here. A lot of people talk about forex, forex as if it is a personal thing. Anything that concerns that entire nation, for me, I am not saying it is not important, but when it goes across board, you shouldn’t allow it to drag you down. Just say that it is everybody’s business. So, let’s move. The banks are suffering the same, the automobile industry is suffering the same and everybody producing something is suffering the same thing. Why not me?
Even though you have always had a bias for craftsmanship, designing and creativity, how were you able to acquire the knowledge of precision engineering machines and other tools associated with the invention of electric cars and others?
The knowledge I got is based on passion. I have the feeling that the university degree or one of those certificates, degrees that you get is just a way of satisfying the yearnings of the society that I want to be a graduate. But everybody has his inner passion, something that gives him joy.
Your cousin is a former President. Why are you not involved in politics considering that you were once an activist?
I think that he has already conquered the field and I was trying as much as possible to live under his shadow, the shadow of politics. I don’t want something like oh, your brother is there, so why are you competing? What are you doing? If he carved a niche for himself as a politician, for the rest of the century, Nigerians will remember him as once a Nigerian president. The likelihood of my becoming president is not there. At least, let me also be remembered as the one who invented or who produced engines, who drove technology in Nigeria so that when they are writing, they will write mine too separately.