In the Icon this week, we present to you the National President, Association of Nigeria Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), Prince Olayiwola Shittu (JP). Please take time to read and note why our team deemed it fit to have him as our Icon this week.
When the current National President of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA), Prince Olayiwola Farudeen Shittu (JP) embarked on this journey of comprehensively re-branding ANLCA in character and outlook, little did the onlookers and members alike know that the aspiring candidate for the National President of ANLCA was damned serious about everything he voiced out including his body language.
Beginning with the flag-off of the campaigns launching in Lagos, it became obvious that Prince Shittu has an agenda to make all members of ANLCA are just as passionate as he is in the re-branding project. At take off, it was explicitly made known that those who throw stones in their compound risk the potential of hurting their loved ones if they persist.
In the process of re-branding ANLCA, many factors conspired to make it the lord’s doing such that every step taken led to the success the body savours today.
Looking at the great ANLCA leader, Prince Olayiwola Shittu- a Prince of Ighogho town in Oyo state brought up in a serene environment of Epe in Lagos State, sojourned in Warri/Koko, Delta state and Port Harcourt in Rivers State for over forty years, relocated to Lagos in order to work assiduously to uplift ANLCA from its much taunted image.
The National President with the strength of character and poise which he generously put to use to sere ANLCA and by extension the maritime industry selflessly and at the expense of his business, ran ANLCA all inclusively.
His business is customs brokerage, even though he has interests in the hospitality, agriculture and insurance, he has structures in place to ensure that he devoted almost one hundred percent of his time to run ANLCA. Little wonder then that he was able to achieve the kind of respect for the members and the institution of ANLCA.
How did he do it? Prince Olayiwola Shittu gave an indication that he is not contesting the National presidency of ANLCA just for the fun of it, when on his zonal flag offs in Lagos, Port Harcourt and Kano he made it known to his expectant audience then that it was not going to be business as usual. He told those that graced the occasions that he was contesting to make a lasting impression and most importantly, to leave a legacy of selfless service in ANLCA such that when he is done, ANLCA would have attained and even surpassed the status of the rave-making professional bodies.
After the zonal launching, he went round all the chapters in Nigeria sensitize and appealed to all interests and groupings within the freight forwarding industry during the electioneering campaigns which was largely peaceful, devoid of the then assumed acrimonious dispositions.
Prince Shittu came off overwhelmingly tops. This was the tunic he needed to hit the ground running.
In his first week after the elections on the 17th of April, 2010 in Owerri, the Imo State capital, he got a temporary secretariat which surprisingly and coincidentally instructive has the “Lord’s Doing House” inscribed on it.
Without any administrative structure inherited, Prince Olayiwola Shittu began to assemble a structure and personnel to assist him in the task of re-branding ANLCA which operated then within an undefined business environment.
Going forward, he made sure that all the elected and appointed officials of ANLCA are committed to raising the profile of ANLCA-that is sharing his vision of a re-engineered, re-invigorated and rejuvenated ANLCA by ensuring that regular meetings are held to make sure that everyone keyed into this vision. Expectedly, all the elected executives and appointees understood the import of the journey embarked upon some four years ago.
Thereafter, it became crystal clear that a cohesive and united ANLCA was set to dictate the tune in the industry. With the much detested collaboration with sister organizations, persuasive partnership with relevant key stakeholders in the industry, ANLCA began to earn the respect and recognition it rightly deserved. This is courtesy of the focused leadership of Prince Olayiwola Shittu- a Justice of Peace (JP) who loves ANLCA so much as to selflessly serve it with all he has got.
Prince Shittu did not it all running smoothly. Of course, he had right from the word go, some entrenched interests to contend with, those who resisted change for the better and those who felt that shine is being taken off them. Despite all these sometimes overbearing forces, Prince Shittu, with a strong character trait and uncommon courage, soldiered on with total support key elements of his administration. No wonder that inspite of the unnecessary distractions; he was able to achieve so much in such a short time of his first tenure as the National President of ANLCA.
Somehow, Prince Olayiwola Shittu has been able to manage the irrelevant distracters to the extent that, in the open, the distracters “embarrass the National President with “unalloyed loyalty” but behind, they continue to twist facts, standing facts on their heads while they continue to concoct deadened schemes that fall flat on their faces at the attempt of implementation. These types of characters have made it difficult for a very few members of ANLCA to imbibe the import of a re-branded ANLCA.
The question which has consistently troubled the minds of the entire stakeholders especially freight forwarders is what happens to ANLCA if Prince Shittu insists on retiring to his farm after his first tenure expires on the 16th of April?
Key watchers of the evolution of the now internationally recognized ANLCA which recently won the best customs brokers association award in South Africa and a member of the International Federation of Customs Brokers Association (IFCBA) are united in their stand that for now, none other than Prince Olayiwola Shittu is most suited to sustain the laudable heights to which ANLCA has risen.
If you tarry to ponder over what happens to ANLCA if Prince Shittu refuses to return for a second term, you are likely to conclude on a through back to the past. Just be sincere to yourself, do you think the zeal, vitality and understanding that currently pervades ANLCA can be sustained? Your guess if you like what you hear, see or feel about ANLCA is as good as mine.
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