By Bart Nnaji
It was for a divine purpose that I met Pascal Gabriel Dozie over 30 years ago. Our first meeting was in the early 1990s when we were members of the Vision 2010 Committee, a team set up to provide a strategic direction for Nigeria to become a higher-medium income nation by 2010. Some credible sources attribute to him the idea of Vision 2010, but PGD, as he was popularly known, never took the credit. He was self-effacing. What is well known is that it was engineered by PGD and his cohorts of leaders in the Nigerian economy, including Chief Ernest Shonekan, and they convinced the then Head of State, General Sani Abacha, to set up the Vision 2010 Committee.
There are many institutions PGD was instrumental in founding without noise, including Diamond Bank, MTN Nigeria, Lagos Business School, Nigeria Economic Summit Group, etc. But the one that significantly touched my family’s life and the lives of many Nigerians is Geometric Power’s Aba Integrated Power Project.
In 2005, after the concession of the Aba Ring-fenced Area for the Aba Integrated Power Project (Aba IPP) was granted by President Olusegun Obasanjo’s government and development was completed, PGD was the first person to buy into the vision of the Aba Integrated Power Project, which has turned out to be one of the largest indigenous investments in the South-East region of our dear country, Nigeria. Even when there were no private power companies operating in the country at that time, and the banks had never invested in any power ventures, he understood and supported the vision that through the Aba IPP concession, the power sector would blossom. Under his leadership, Diamond Bank provided the critically needed facility to commence construction of the project. Diamond Bank, before its merger with Access Bank, became the arranger of finance for the completion of the project. PGD invested financially and emotionally in the project because of his utter commitment to improving the welfare of the people. Because of the trust other bankers and the business community in general had in his vision, the Aba IPP project was able to attract funds from other banks and investors despite the global recession and subsequent economic challenges in our dear country.
Despite his preeminent role in both the Aba Integrated Power Project and Geometric Power Ltd, Ndaa Pascal, as his Owerri kinsmen and women refer to him, was never obstructive in the affairs of either the project or the company. He was steadfast and practicalized his Christian faith in the power of the Almighty to see us through the multiple, (and mind-boggling) challenges that the Aba Integrated Project has gone through over the last 15 years, since we both firmly believed that it would be for the overall benefit of the masses.
He saw me as his son, and I, in turn, related to him as my father. My wife Agatha and I see ourselves as part of the PGD family. In PGD, I witnessed the Christian virtues of solidarity, love, humility, altruism, and genuine spirituality. I have never met in flesh and blood anyone who compares to him on the same scale.
My family and I, as well as the Geometric Power team, will always have great and fond memories of Ndaa Pascal G. Dozie, a rare and unassuming being who the Almighty God has used to touch multiple lives across the globe, and change the development history of our nation positively.
We will miss his physical presence and his calm, wise counsel very much.
Professor Bart Nnaji, CON, NNOM, FAS is Chairman, Geometric Power Group.
