By Elijah Oyigu.
The Director General of National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA), Professor Seidu Onailo Mohammed alongside others have bagged the most coveted award in the Igala Kingdom code named as Who is Who in Igala land.
Professor Seidu was awarded at an event on Saturday held at Transcorp Hilton, Abuja to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Who is Who in Igala land and also Launch the sixth edition of Who is Who Book which was first debuted in 1995.
Written by Mr Hillary Amodu, the Book was a well researched documentary of selected elites of Igala extractions whose determined efforts and humane leadership services in both private and public endeavours have bettered the fortunes of Igala sons and daughters.
The award which is seen as the most prestigious award in Igala land, was said to be on the basis of the awardees’ contributions to the development of Igala Kingdom.
When asked by newsmen after the event of his post-award speech, Alhaji Seidu, the erudite professor of Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System, said the best way to live on earth was to serve mankind in whatever capacity one finds himself.
“My understanding of life is all about service, especially service to mankind regardless of where you are and what you have. I thank the Almighty Allah for making them recognizing me for this award. I dedicate this award to Allah.” Prof Seidu said.
Until his appointment as the Director General of the country’s space agency, Prof Seidu, only met seven staff with PhD qualifications but his visionary leadership drive and his quest to have indigenous professionals manning the various departments and units within the agency has added several other personnel with higher degrees.
As part of the agency’s apparent commitment to capacity building, the number of PhD holders has presently grown to 71 staff while over 54 others who are presently on their doctoral degree programmes across the various universities in the Globe will round up their programmes by the summer of 2017 thereby totaling the number of Doctoral Degree holders within the agency to over 120 personnel.
NASRDA under the watch of Prof Seidu Onailo Mohammed, has launched three different satellites and is one government agency that believes in redefining the activities of government agency through effective leadership by training people to believe in their innate abilities and utilizing same in pursuit of nation building, an exploit that should be emulated by other governmental agencies and parastatals.
Under the superintendence of Prof Seidu, NASRDA successfully built, developed, and launched an indigenous processed satellite into the orbit, the first of its kind in the history of the country.
Designed and built to flight standard by Nigerian engineers using the facilities of Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) in Guildford, United Kingdom, the satellite, code named as Nigeria-Sat X was successfully launched and less than seven days of its voyage within the orbit, the satellite returned back pictures.
The spacecraft, launched sometimes in August 2012, gives the African nation a powerful new capability to map its own lands and other parts of the globe.
Meanwhile, other Igala sons and daughters whose humanitarian services improved on the fate of Igala people were also awarded. They include, Alhaji Isah Jibrin (Alias Echocho), Hajia Salamatu Umar-Eluma, Lolo Ojochide Onyema amongst others.
Popularly known as Echocho, Mr. Isah has a PhD in Economics and bagged First Class Grade in the same field during his first degree. He is a Banker per excellence and a creative Economic Analyst as well as a sound Policy Consultant and has helped many Igala sons and daughters during his days at the defunct Afribank Plc.
On her part, Hajia Salamatu is seen by many as the Mother Theresa of Igala land. She is presently the Director of Human Resources at Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria. She is a benevolent woman of no mean status.
Hajia Salamutu Umar-Eluma
NASRDA DG – Prof Seidu Onailo Muhammed
Lolo Ojochide Onyema
For Lolo Ojochide Onyema, the Vice Chairperson of Peace Airline, giving hope to the hopeless through charity deeds remains her watchword. She has assisted a lot of Igala sons and daughters especially in the area of employment.
Elijah Oyigu, a Journalist, wrote in from Abuja.
