Pastor Jide Ogunsakin, President and Senior Pastor Of New Kingdom Church International and CEO OF BJ Properties breath freshness on the way forward to make Nigeria great again. With God and with the infusion of his property and construction company in infrastructural provisions. Bringing in investors and foreign partners to help Nigeria see through the challenges.
Can we get to meet you sir?
My name is Pastor Jide Ogunsakin, President and senior pastor of New Kingdom church International in Abuja and the CEO of DG Flex Global Limited and BJ Properties and Construction Company.
How have you been able to combine those 2 works, the business and the spiritual aspect of it?
About business, you just have to have the idea. Once you have the idea, you can have people to co-ordinate to get the job done. It’s just by the grace of God that I am able to combine both. But my primary assignment is the work of God. That’s my passion. I also like to reach out to people and see how I can help develop the country.
You are one of the men of God with so much passion for the country. Why is it that you still believe in Nigeria?
You see, I pity a lot of people that are doing well, especially our men of God and they are not thinking about the future of this nation. The future of this nation is the future of anybody. Notwithstanding the position you have attained in life, no matter who you are, if you do not have the heart for this country, your future is at stake. That’s why the bible says pray for the peace of your nation so that you can also have peace. That’s why I have so much interest in this country because of the name that people have given to Nigeria in abroad. Our image is so bad.
I always tell people whenever I’m in abroad that if you want to see a good Nigerian, look at me because I want to feel like I’m not a mistake being a Nigerian and Nigeria is still the best thing that can happen to anyone as far as I’m concerned. I want to be a part of the system that works. I have passion for the nation because I know that if the nation is ok, I will be okay and generations after me will be okay. We cannot be focusing on our self and not think about the nation because if we do that, our nation, the future of our families, the future of our children is at stake.
What exactly do you think is the root of our problems? Is there problem from our mindset or our forefathers?
There are a lot of reasons why we are where we are. One,I can say that the foundational issue began at the amalgamation of this nation in 1914. There were a lot of errors and faults. Secondly, the white people thatcame had their own selfish interests. They had their own bias mind, they were not objective even though they could project into the future, they deliberately projected something that would affect the future. unfortunately, we didn’t have futuristic and deep thinking leaders
One thing that makes things to work are your divine ideas, divine insight and divine foresight. Any leader that does not have this 3, might not be able to do something that is generational. It affects this country, how many people are really wealthy in Nigeria? The politicians that are seen to have wealth mostly see it and they are not able to manage their businesses to make it generational and they keep collapsing. This is because the money they claim they have is the money they stole. That’s not wealth. Wealth is the ability to have divine ideas, divine insight and divine foresight, to be able to start from scratch and do a business that starts small and grows and outgrows. That the business strives when you are even long gone.
Let’s look at our old wealthy people, King Jaja of Opobo. In his days, he was one of the richest with a white man as his secretary but today, what can you say of his generation? They are poor. Also MKO Abiola is one of the people I love as my mentor in those days but his business could not outgrow him. Look, there’s no Concord anymore. All the empires he built crashed. This is because we have not really seen genuine wealthy people that can have so much foresight that will make things to be generational. That’s what is affecting us as a nation because the nation is built by the people. For example, when you look at our road systems, they are poor. There are some roads that have been contracted more than 10 times and they keep paying over and over again and the road keeps getting destroyed. What they do is that they spend so much money on the contract but they build rubbish because of corruption and they don’t even finish the project but they settle everyone. They won’t even finish the project but the project is approved as though has been completed.
The error is from our forefathers. There is no foresight. We are like the generation of Esau in the bible who are not futuristic but the generation of Jacob are the futuristic generation. Future is actually the true living. When we look at Nigeria, I cannot really mention 5 to 10 people that are really wealthy. When you look at the world’s wealthy people, you can’t trace their wealth to government, they are great thinkers. Look at the CEO of Facebook, you can’t trace any link of anybody, country or government. He was just a thinker, futuristic about his thought and had foresight. He is a billionaire in dollars. That’s what we call true wealth. How many people in Nigeria can say they are wealthy and they can do without the country. That’s why in this country now, if you are against the government, your wealth will go down because one way or the other, your wealth is linked to the government. That’s the problem.Our leaders should be more futuristic, they should allow their thinking ability to be generational. We need to educate people on generational thinking. Not just thinking like Esau and that will help us as a nation
We heard that you have been shopping or lobbying for investors, can you throw more light on that?
That’s the reason I was thinking how I could help Nigeria become well in my own small way. I foresee a great Nigeria. Based on that, I decided to shop for some investors abroad. God was able to give me some in the US and we have spoken and I’m being futuristic about what we are trying to do. They have the money and are not interested in collecting money or contract from anybody. They are just interested in the country giving them opportunity, infrastructure that is needed for us to build a great Nigeria in future. I was focused on the basic things that the country needs: property (real estate) which connects to road network. Looking at the plan of people buying houses rather than renting. We are trusting God that like of Dallas that has one of the best road network because the government gives the contract to private organizations but don’t give them a dime.
The government enters into MOU with the private organization and conclude that the company manages this road for years (20 to 50 years) to recoup their money back and after, they hand it back to the government after years of maintenance.
Once we begin to have this kind of futuristic mindset, no contractor will be coming here to mess us up and collect our money without doing the right work and these are the people I want to bring on board
Which other aspects are you looking at?
We are looking at the real estate, educational sector. How we can build people’s university, meaning we will create jobs for students who are indigenous to work while schooling just like it is being done in abroad. This helps them to manage their lives by meeting their basic needs. Your school fees will be taking care of so far as you meet the qualifications but you will still work. That’s the part of the educational sector we are looking to solve.
What can you say about the power sector?
One of the foundational problems in Nigeria is that we don’t have power. A lot of Nigerians that are thinkers are not able to establish in the country because power infrastructure limits your business even in the presence of foresight because cost of production is so high and this is a serious problem…We don’t have power systems and power can go off more than 10 times in 24 hours even in the capital Abuja.Another problem is the inconsistency of the meter and inefficiency of PHCN to have the meters working. However, they charge outrageous amounts for electricity. That makes life unbearable for people.So what I want to do is to bring this people into the country through state government to power a certain state for assurance and show it is possible. Because these people are private investors and they are goal oriented plus they will be financing the project so they will make sure they do good job.
The assumption that there is no electricity because of the sale of generator. Could this affect the project?
We are trusting God that they will give us Infrastructure to be able to help us to operate and the effort of these investors will not be jeopardized. The government can do it, the problem in there is a collaborator. The federal government will be convinced if we start in a state and the state is powered with 24 hours. The good news is that we are not asking government to give us a dime
Which state are you looking at to start this project?
Lagos state precisely, because it is a commercial state. Whatever you are able to make work in Lagos it is possible in the other states.
In conclusion, your advice for the government of the day
Let us be more futuristic, better thinkers. We can organize think tank. Look at professionals who can come together and solve problems in certain areas and submit their recommendations about current problems and the government must implement them.
Advice to the new 43 ministers
Those who are not professionals in the area of their portfolio should wake up and really learn and learn more about the portfolio given to them, so that they can have more impact and effect change. I want to ask that they educate themselves, develop themselves and it will enhance their ability to bring change.
Advice to Christians in the country
I encourage Christians to unite. Let us walk in unification of the spirit. Do not discriminate, church is church. Let us drop this denominational mentality. I want to encourage our leaders, our elders, our fathers in faith that they should work on building a one spirit filled, that is one accord church in this country to make Christians have a better voice.
Once a new member enters the church, what should he be looking out for?
He should be looking out for taking dominion in the kingdom of God and taking their place in this generation, knowing fully that God has brought them forth to be a king in the kingdom of God, so anywhere they go to, they begin to see that there is a need to carry themselves as Kings and wherever the word of the King is, there is power.
What do you want to say to our Muslim brothers and sisters?
They should embrace peace. I know that Islam is a religion of peace. Let us not permit anyone to hide under the canopy of religion to perpetuate evil. Let’s stop evil, crisis, violence and that’s the only way we can have a great Nigeria.
Advice to government in handling Muslim Christian crisis?
To be objective.
Not to have religious bias.
Genuine independent judiciary system. Encourage president Buhari to work on having an independent Judiciary system based on the constitution of the country. If it is working well, we would have a great nation
Your final words
Let everybody live together in harmony, peace and love. We are all brothers, if we want Nigeria to be great again, we must all work together to make it great. Let’s work together to make Nigeria great.