The Chief Executive Officer of Lead Capital Limited, Mr. Abimbola Olashore, who is also the President of Council of the Nigeria British Chamber of Commerce, takes a nostalgic look at his childhood and life lessons in this engaging conversation. Reminiscing about growing up in a close-knit community where children gathered on the floor for Tales by Moonlight, he reflects on how those formative years shaped his values and worldview. Now older and wiser, Olashore, who is also an educationist, co-founder of Olashore International School and farmer, admits that if given another chance, he would have been more deliberate about his approach to money, health, and life. His reflections offer a mix of cultural nostalgia and practical wisdom for younger generations striving for balance and purpose. Dike Onwuamaeze brings the excerpts:

Share with us some recollections of your childhood memories?

I am a product of the 1960s and 1970s. I was born in the sixties and my formative years in the seventies when I think that we enjoyed the best of Nigeria. I was born in Kano in the northern Nigeria and we moved to Lagos in the southern Nigerian in 1967. I am one of those people that were born in one part of the country but grew up in a different part of the country. My family still has extensive roots in the north. I grow up in the seventies in a normal middleclass upbringing. My mother was a teacher and my dad was an accountant and was working with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). I attended all my primary and secondary schools in Lagos.   

With your childhood years spent in both the northern southern parts of the country, how do see the current centrifugal forces blowing across the country? 

It is just a bit unfortunate that we have mismanaged our diversity. We have truly mismanaged our federalism. I am one of those lucky people in the sense that we grew up not knowing the difference between the north and south and everybody was your friend. Social forces did not differentiate between religion and ethnicity.  When I look back at my career in banking, I was fortunate that it took me to every part of Nigeria when we went about visiting customers. We will take a number of days and take off from Lagos, and we will drive to Benin, Asaba, Onitsha, and all the way to Aba and to Port Harcourt by road to see our customers. In those days, you can fly to Abuja and drive to Jos to see customers, and from there you go to Zaria and then to Kano all by road without thinking that any part of the country was not your terrain. But unfortunately, now, I have a lot of friends who live in Lagos and have never left Lagos. How can those people think that they will manage Nigeria when they have not been around Nigeria? They are influenced by what they read online and what people tell them on social media. And unfortunately, that form of information is so pervasive, but it is forming peoples’ opinion of other parts of the country. We have totally mismanaged the strength we should have had in diversity to such an extent that everybody has a distrust of other people. And if an individual does you wrong, you ascribe it to his or her tribe. When I look at my own experience, the people who have been most influential in my life, and have been very consequential in my career and my   progress, are not even from my ethnic stock. That is why I kept on saying that we have totally, totally mismanaged our diversity and what that should be a source of strength is now a source of disunity.

What do you consider to be the fondest part of your childhood memories?

I think that it is probably more of the carefree attitude. We grew up in an environment that was very safe and very serene, and highly structured. Those were the days when television did not start until probably 4p.m or 6p.m. What I remember mostly is that we were living in Victoria Island and the NTA station is on Ahmadu Bello Way, which was a stone’s throw away. So, we were the kids who used to form the fulcrum of their programming between 4 to 6 p.m. We were the ones sitting on the floor for Tales at Moon Light , or the ones who will do the quiz show, or were the audience. For us, it was very enlightening, and I used to enjoy it especially the quiz shows. It was also part of our education because children’s programme then was quite educating. It complemented whatever we were learning in schools. It also gave us exposure.

How did your early education in Lagos shape your worldview and academic curiosity?

Interestingly, I went to St. Gregory College, which is a first-class school. When I entered St. Gregory College, it was still run by the Catholic Church. It was in the middle of my stay in college that the government took over the school. So I can tell you the remarkable difference when it was run by the Catholic Church and the government. The school used to end with what we called the afternoon lunch. What we ate for lunch in school was probably better than what we would eat at home. Going to a school like St. Gregory College, obviously, gave you, in addition to what your family will give to you in terms of moral background, also formed our moral boundaries of what is right and what is wrong. We went to school, which starts shaping how we should behave. Behaviour, respect and all things like that were drummed into you. The moral rules that you should not steal, you should not tell lies were beaten into us at a very young age. Even when I went to the United Kingdom for my A’ Levels and university education, I loved to think that my essence has already been formed even by then. I remember that I was relatively young when I had to go abroad, and the debate was whether I was too young to go and abroad and be in a boarding school on my own at the age of 15. But I think that my early experiences have shaped one for that transition in a foreign land.

What was it like leaving Nigeria at that tender age to go to the United Kingdom?

A lot of things are quite fortuitous. The school I went to in the UK, one of my dad’s closest friends had his son in the school. I went to a school that was already established in The UK with a track record of Nigerians going there. I never saw things like racism because I went to a very receptive environment. So, I felt at home, but coping with the weather was my first major challenge. I was also lucky that my mum, who was visiting me, and I could communicate with my parents on the phone almost every day if I wished. So I never felt that I am that far away from home.

Did you experience any counter culture or culture shock?

Oh, yes! Certainly, there was a difference. Nigeria’s culture and upbringing of a child is totally different from British culture. The first one I could not understand was the way kids were calling their parents by their first names. How dare you do that in Nigeria? But because they call older people by their first names does not mean that they do not respect them. Respect comes in many different ways.  

In your academic career, you studied engineering and also accountancy. To many people, these two courses are far apart. Why did you go for these courses?

How it happened was a very interesting story. I was a science student when I was in St. Gregory College. I was good at Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, and Pure Mathematics. In those days, if you are good at sciences and also good at Biology, then you should be a medical doctor and if you good in physics, mathematics, then you should be an engineer. But it was also obvious to me what my natural bent was. In my first shot at JAMB, I put accountancy as my first choice and engineering for my second choice. It was because I loved Mathematics and accountancy related more to my mathematical background. I was offered admission to study at the University of Ilorin, but the school said that I was too young. And that was how I went to England. But my friends who stayed behind in Nigeria were writing JAMB and were being offered admission into the universities, while I was abroad doing A-Levels. So, I wrote JAMB again, but this time I flipped it around and had engineering as my first choice and accountancy as my second choice. I passed JAMB and was given admission at the University of Lagos to study engineering. But my dad persuaded me to continue with my A-Levels and I obeyed him. I finished my A-levels and was given admission to study Electronic Engineering in the UK. That put paid to accountancy at that time. Could you believe it that I spent four years studying engineering, but I told everybody that I did not enjoy it and I did not like it at all! I always felt that I was someone who could reason but I was not very good with my hands. As someone doing electronic engineering, part of my practical was always to build circuit boards and soldering irons. I could design, but when it comes to building, I had a problem. In my final year, I did robotics as my specialty. I picked robotics because it was purely academic at that time, and I did not have to build anything. All I did was write programs to control robots, satellites etc. By the time I finished engineering I made up my mind that I do not want to be an engineer. I was part of a number of career talks in the UK and I felt that the career path for engineers in the UK was quite limiting.  By the time I started doing my career tours and went to Rolls-Royce, they would take us to their warehouse, their engineering centre and my question was always: why not take us to your headquarters and let the managing director address us?  But I also noticed that the managing directors of these engineering firms were not engineers but accountants or people who studied classics, sales and marketing, while the engineers were at the engineering centre that was probably 200 miles away from the head office. So, I was getting a bit disillusioned because I have already made the decision that in my career path there must be a way to the top. So, by the time I graduated I sold all my engineering books. I told myself that I am done with this engineering. Let me now do a course that can lead me to the boardroom and to the top. My thought then was to switch and do Statistics. But this is where life plays fortunate or unfortunate role in our destiny path. I came back to Nigeria in the summer to do my NYSC programme. I had already been taken at the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA) because I did electronic engineering. But that was when my dad lost his job as Managing Director of First Bank of Nigeria. So, I had to travel to the UK to do one or two things for him. By the time I came back, the NYSC camp had started, and they refused me to join that batch because I arrived one week late and had missed the registration. That was when Nigeria had rules. So I complied and came back home. By that time, my dad had started his consultancy firm, which was the precursor of the Lead Merchant Bank. Those few months I was hanging with him in his consultancy office, and one of his partners, Mr. Njoku who came from the Nigerian Stock Exchange, started telling me about the stock market. I now changed my mind that I want to become an accountant. I later joined the NYSC’s second batch and when I finished worked with Deloitte. I spent three years there and became a chartered accountant. I always tell people that some of us enjoyed Nigeria. The time I finished was the banking boom and once you are a chartered accountant, you will enter a bank as an officer of assistant manager. I was also lucky that I on some prizes in ICAN and people wanted an ICAN prize winner, I joined the Lead Merchant Bank, which was founded by my dad, and my natural gravitation was toward the capital market and corporate finance. That was why my career was in corporate finance and investment banking.

How was it like starting life as a banker?

There was a banking boom. Government policies also shaped opportunities. In the early 1990s, they started privatisation. This was also followed with capital increase for banks. All of a sudden, there were lot of opportunities and transactions were going on. We were a merchant bank, and we had Njoku who came from the Stock exchange. So, we naturally started bidding for those kinds of works. Obviously, my dad was well known in banking, and we started getting mandates and started making our reputation. So, I was right at the heart of the boom which shaped ones experiences and made me knowledgeable about capital raising, balance sheet. When I began my career in banking, I really rode a wave of opportunities and was able to take advantage of them. It was also a time when the market was developing and we were also in the forefront of market development with new things happening in the marketplace. When you are at the heart of such momentous changes in an environment and you are at the forefront of it, naturally you will almost become an expert and will be well known. You will be invited to do position papers and I think that was what probably raised my reputation more during that period.

You have been in the banking industry since the 1990s. What have changed in that sub-sector?

I will not comment. I left banking almost 20years ago

What does it mean to be a banker then and now …?

It is different from now. From what I see when I speak with my banking colleagues now is that we had a lot of latitude to take initiatives. Even as a bank managing director you could take an initiative then. It is not like this current environment that is so heavily regulated to such an extent that everything is rules. But how do you advance knowledge if you do not use initiative? It is initiatives that enable you to explore new opportunities. Now, only “A” or “B” are the options. Bur we had a bit more latitude for creativity. The relationship with the regulator was much more cordial in the past even though they were our bosses. You could walk into their offices and sit down and discuss your problems. Today, if you tell your regulator that you are having a problem, you will get a fine. The regulators used to have listening ears. When you send your returns they will go through it and call you to explain some aspects in your return. But we get this feeling today that it is more of master-servant relationship and I wonder what happened. I tell current bank managing directors that you guys are not having fun at all. You are just being summoned left, right and centre. There are summons everyday even from National Assembly’s committees and you can imagine that layer of oversight. I never appeared before any Senate committee. Today, managing director’s job is more of government relations and managing that aspect rather than focusing on innovations. How do you fund new industries, SMEs, innovations, entrepreneurs if everything is by the rule because most entrepreneurs will never pass the test? He has no collateral. He has no contribution. He only has an idea. Can I fund him if I am to go by the rules? I tell everybody that we have lost an aspect of entrepreneurial banking. The banks we had in the 1990s and early 2000 were set up by entrepreneurs and had entrepreneurial mindset that could see other entrepreneurs in other industries and give them money. Where is the discretion if I cannot lend without collateral?  Before, integrity and name were collateral but today they are intangible.

How do you unwind during weekends?

I spent my middle years probably not too much on unwinding. But God has given me the opportunity to be able to retire from banking and to spend more time on other things that are also important for a balanced life. I tell people to always balance their social, religious and work lives.  I play the game of golf at every opportunity I have. I was introduced to it in the 1990s but I never played it. I used to tell myself that I do not have time for this. But as I was getting toward the end of my career I started picking it up and realised that it is probably the best way to unwind. For three four hours you can be there on your own thinking about your own life. You can also be there with people you have the same shared interest and be discussing in a relaxed atmosphere without social pressure. What else is better than that?

What advice could you have given to yourself when you were 25 years?

It is to be a bit more intentional. I think that I have been careless in some areas of life. I shake my head sometimes when I look at the opportunities that I have had. With what that I have known now, I should be a little more careful with money and even with investment. But I always tell people to make some mistakes when they are young because there is enough time for them to recover. I will also be more intentional about my health. I was very careless in the first 40 years of my life when I was not playing any sports.

You have just assumed office as the President of NBCC. Sir, what are we going to see during your tenure?

I am quite happy and proud to be elected the 19th President of NBCC. Our role is well cut out, which is facilitating trade between Nigeria and The United Kingdom (UK) and to build on what that have been already achieved. Obviously, I am hoping that my tenure will be characterised by further deepening of that trade. We believe that there is a lot more that we can do with that facilitation. We are also looking at how we can open up our branch in London to have memberships in London for a proper cross-fertilisation of ideas. We have opened our trade centre, which is a one stop-shop for information on anything concerning trade between Nigeria and The UK. I do believe that we should make our advocacy a bit more forceful and that our voice must be heard by both regulators and governments on both sides. So that the opinion we give, which is a reflective of the opinion of our members, is well listened to. I am also coming into office at a time when The UK has a renewed interest on Nigeria and is very keen at building a trade between Nigeria and UK, which informed The UK Enhanced Partnership Agreement that gives quota free, tariff free export duty to UK.