What saddens my heart about Nigerian Youths—Sen. Gbenga Kaka’s son, Hamzat

Mr. Hamzat Ayotunde Kaka, Co-CEO, OCS Inventory and Professional Services Ltd
 Hamzat Opeyemi Ayotunde Kaka is the first son and
scion of the dynasty of Senator Sefiu
Adegbenga Kaka,
a time commissioner, two time Senator of the Federal
Republic (Ogun East Senatorial zone) and former Deputy Governor of Ogun state. He studied Agric Economics
at Olabisi Onabanjo University, Ago Iwoye in Ogun state
and later got his masters’ degree in accounting from the University Of Hull, United Kingdom. Ayotunde Kaka famously known as AK among his circle of friends is a Chattered Accountant with many
years of  experience with blue chip firms
home and abroad. Apart from having a stake in several of his father’s investments,
he is equally into his private business as a consultant to several local and
international firms. Ayotunde Kaka
is the Co-CEO of OCS Inventory and
Professional Services
, an accounting consultancy firm. Very quite and
unassuming, the Kaka boy loves
football as a hubby and he is an Arsenal
fan for life. He is equally a director of Solace
farms ltd.
 In a rare encounter with your Africa’s Number
1 Celebrity Encounter Blog, Asabeafrika on
Friday, March 10th, this very dynamic yet unassuming Nigerian shared
some of his life philosophies with us and equally shared his opinion on how
government can give more attention to youth development than infrastructural
development in Nigeria. Enjoy the excerpts.

‘My name is Ayotunde Hamzat Kaka’

Sir, can we meet you formally?


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Good morning
Mr. Dan Asabe. My name is Ayotunde Hamzat Kaka.
You are an entrepreneur, how would
you describe leadership?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika…’I believe leadership is about the gene’

It is
usually said that leadership is inborn. But I think leadership is much of Geno-type and the environment. Yes, you might be born with a strong gene but my
pain is that youth of these days are a bit laid back. But we can also call it a
general phenomenon due to the environment we find ourselves. The environment
seems not to be too encouraging and you find out that the youths are a bit laid
back. They don’t aspire and work hard towards achieving their dreams. Most of
them dream quite, alright, but I don’t think they dream in the right direction.

Senator Adegbenga Kaka

They want to have material wealth without having to go through the real channel
of hard work. But I believe people like Mark Zulgerberk
the Face
book
founder and other inspiring youth-leaders around the world should
be a good inspiration to our youths. The youths in our clime need to draw
inspiration from them. Yes, we have found ourselves in a very disheartening
situation but I will still say we can dream out of our challenges. So in my own
definition, I think leadership is inborn but we should strive towards achieving
success by working hard.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’Yes, our youths found themselves in a very demoralized environment but we can always overcome’

When you look critically at the  level of youth disorientation in Nigeria, the
way and manner our young ones have turned themselves to lotto addicts, drug
addicts and cigarette addicts, how do you feel as a youth leader?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’It is a pity youths of nowadays now play lotto bets than being creative’

It is a very,
very sad situation that majority of our youths don’t have the right channel to
direct their energy. Our youths are no doubt very energetic but the situation
around them is quite disheartening when you find youths at lotto shops playing
bets. We can’t totally blame it on government. We have to share part of the
blame with the parent. Most parents didn’t properly mentor their kids while
growing up and that has resulted in a cream of disorientated youths in the
society. It is a systemic problem really.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’Most parents didn’t properly mentor their kids’

You said Parents are to be majorly blamed
for the malaise of youths in our clime. But do you think there is a way
government can activate a culture of re-orientation among our youths?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’The Government and the parents are to be blamed for Youth decadence in Nigeria’

I will say
that  the government cannot be totally
absolved from the blame of the young people because they failed to put in place
a check and balance mechanism. They should equally have a large portion of the
blame as well because we found out that governments nowadays focus on
infrastructural development. When I talk about infrastructural development, I
am actually talking about the construction of roads, bridges and other
infrastructures to the detriment of character reform. If you build the
infrastructure and you fail to build the people that will manage those
infrastructures, then, you are wasting your time because people are going to
maintain those structures you erected. Even at state level, you find out that
governors are building roads and you wonder what are they going to do about the
human resources, I mean the human beings 
that will manage those infrastructures.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’The education sector in Nigeria has been serially bastardized by mediocres’ 

The educational sector has been
serially bastardized by people who know next to nothing about human resources
development. It is really, really disheartening. So, the government cannot be
totally absolved from the blame. Why? When these kids were toddlers, they were
enrolled in schools from primary education to secondary and tertiary education.
But when you look at our education sector from the primary down to the
secondary, you find out that our youths grew in a very demoralized environment.
As I am speaking with you, you will still find school structures in this
country with leaking roofs, with nothing or less furniture for convenient
education. So, how do you generate a positive energy from people trained in
such environment?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’The government needs to do more of Youths’ character reforms than infrastructural development’

Those are the areas government is expected to play her part,
not focusing more on roads and bridges alone. 
Yes, you can tell me ‘we are doing
these projects because we are investing in the future of this state’
.  But remember that it is these same neglected
kids that are going to live in the future. So you must build the young people
that will take care of the future today. I want to enjoin our governors and the
government at both the federal, state and local government levels to ‘please, concentrate on the youths’. To
kindly pay more attention to human capacity development. Pay a little more
attention to education which is a very, very key part to building a cream of
energetic, dynamic and innovative leaders that will drive the future.

The GDA in the heart of the encounter with Ayotunde Kaka

If you are to find yourself in a
ballroom with a million Nigerian youth and you are the chief moderator, what
would you be telling them about dreams, innovation and success?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’I will tell the youths to be innovative and focused if you want wealth’

What I will
tell the Nigerian youths is that they should remain focused. When you dream and
you imagine yourself living a good life, driving good cars…don’t just end that
dream in the realm of self aggrandizement. Think of positive ways to achieve
those dreams, you can actually win your dreams legitimately. Think of ways out
and not by winning lotto over night
or doing drugs. There are lots of positive things you can get involve in, that
will give you success. They should attend seminars, read newspapers and get
accustomed to a lot of opportunities online at this age. When I say online, I
don’t mean fraud but genuine opportunities that can guarantee you genuine
success. So they should channel their energies towards positive things and they
should believe in themselves. Stop the blame game; stop blaming government or
anyone for your woes. Yes, government might have failed you excessively but
your ability to seek genuine opportunities will help.

The GDA in a tete-a-tete with Mr. Kaka during the encounter

Apart from being a chattered accountant,
I learnt you are also into Agric. How is life as an entrepreneur?

The GDA meets the Scion of the Senator Gbenga Kaka dynasty, Mr. Hamzat Ayotunde Kaka

I am
prominently an accountant with a flair for Agric business. I cannot run away
from Agric because I was born into agriculture. However, talking about Agriculture
and how it can develop the youth, it is sad today we don’t find youth that are
interested in doing that business. Agriculture right now seems to be the only
way out apart from IT. But youth of nowadays sees farming as a dirty job.
Instead, they prefer the non-existing white collar jobs. But the energy in the
youths can be properly invested in farming. The white collar jobs the youths of
nowadays are searching for are not even available and that is the real
situation on ground.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’We have lesser white collar jobs now. So youths must look towards Agriculture’

I will equally like to enjoin government to work harder to
ensure that her agricultural policy is re-worked to attract the youth. I don’t
think the agricultural policy is so encouraging to farmers. Government too
should play her role by providing agricultural infrastructure and incentives to
encourage more people to go into farming, particular the youths. If you have a
good environment, you can plant yam, grow pepper, grow vegetables and other
farm produce behind your house. That is the way to go now. Instead of waking up
in the morning and running to the lotto
joint, you can change your direction to the farm. You can wake up in the
morning even when there are no jobs; you can till the soil a bit. Plant pepper,
then when you wake up every morning, you can water it until it grows. You can
do more. But our youths are far, far from doing that. It is a pity.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika…’Youths should learn how to till the soil instead of playing lotto’


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From your own experience, what are
the challenges of running a farm?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’Even though i was born into farming, i studied Accounting and Aggro-Economics at OOU’

Well, I will
say I am a farmer by birth. I grew up in the business of farming. My father is a
farmer. I studied Agricultural-Economics from Olabisi Onabanjo University.
I knew at some points I was going to go into farming. I had my master degree in
management and at some points, I felt well, if I could have a degree in Agricultural economics and one in
business management, then, I should be able to add accounting to it. So, I decide
to add accounting to it. So I am a chartered accountant and I run my own
accounting firm as well. I will like to advice the youths that life is not only
about focusing on white collar jobs. I am a farmer, I am also an accountant and
I am into other businesses as an entrepreneur.

Ayotunde Kaka…. ‘I am a farmer, Accountant and Business Solution expert’

Is there any difference between
farming and accounting?
Well, it
depends on the angle you are looking at. Like I said, I did agricultural
economics as my first degree. I had my second degree in business management.
So, when you look at the economic aspect of the Agro-business and you look at
management as a social science, you will discover that adding accounting to it
is not out of the picture. I think it a very nice synchronization of
management, economics and Agro business.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’We need to encourage urban-rural migration instead of rural-urban migration’

 You have equally travelled in the course of
study, what can you say our society need to learn from other advanced societies?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’Politicians misplaces their priorities when it comes to road construction in rural areas’

Well, I
spend most of my life here. However, we have a lot to learn from the western
world. For instance, in the western world, the masses enjoy all of the basic
amenities. But here, you see government at state level talking about
urbanization and providing infrastructures like roads and bridges like I noted
earlier but neglecting the rural areas. I mean, when you see a road that has
probably less than a thousand cars plying it in a day and you see a government
trying to expand the road to a four lane road, while neglecting the muddy roads
in the rural and interior areas of the state where a lot of activities take
place, then, you begin to wonder what is the motive behind such discretion.
That is not the case with the western world. Within the rural areas in the
western countries, you hardly find a farm settlement without quality road
network, without water and without light. 
But here, we keep talking about urbanization without a human face. We
neglect the rural people and just concentrate on the urban areas. I think
politics is grass root, and if the grass root cannot feel it, then, what is the
essence of democracy? So, I just want to appeal to the government, particularly
state governors, I think they are closer to the masses than the federal
government at the central. I want to implore them that they should only not
focus on the urban areas; they should look into the rural areas and encourage
more of urban-rural migration than rural-urban migration.
 President
Muhammadu Buhari came into Nigeria this morning (March 10) as a youth leader
and entrepreneur, do you have a word of advice for Mr. President?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’I feel very reluctant to advice Mr. President. But if i am to do that, i will say he should fix the economy’

We are happy
to have Mr. President back in the country. We are very happy, we all missed
him. But talking about the president and the nation is a very sensitive issue;
I mean for a young man like me, I don’t think I am in the best position to
advice him as a father…
(Cuts in) But you represent the youth
and your voice counts?

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’This government must give Nigeria back to Nigerians’

Considering
the economic situation, we have a country that was diagnosed with different
kind of ailments. I am putting the country in the image of a human being now;
there is corruption here and there. We suffer low infrastructural development and
low economic patronage as a result of the drop in the price of petrol which is
our chief economic earner and this current political dispensation was able to
diagnose the problem successfully. They went to the campaign ground and sold
their ideas and got the votes from Nigerians. They got elected. But having
diagnosed those deficiencies, we expected them to swing into action almost
immediately. But, we saw what happened. It took them about six months to even
appoint ministers and because of the delay, we are paying for that now. 

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’Mr. Buhari’s Government must find a quick solution to Nigeria’s Problems’

I mean when you take in a dying human being
into an intensive care unit or emergency room in the hospital, the doctor will
not ask who shot you, the doctor would not ask for police report.  His job is to stabilize the patient first
before taking stock of who shot you or harm you. But, it is the opposite in Nigeria. I mean the economy was
neglected and government was busy chasing stolen monies and even for six months,
there were no ministers to run the cabinet. I think these are some of the
things responsible for our current situation. But we thank God, I think the
government has now realized her own mistake and we can only hope that things
will get better.

Ayotunde Kaka to Asabeafrika….’Youths should find the creativity in themselves and that will liberate them from hopelessness’

Kindly give a final advice to young
people reading you across the globe. I mean Nigerians presently troubled in
South Africa, Libya and elsewhere?
My advice to
youths all over the world is that they should look inward and ask themselves
what can they do with themselves and for their country? Rome was not built in one single day, it was a gradual process.
Find out who you are, work towards your dream and painfully work towards it so
that you will gainfully enjoy it. Don’t rush out and become a lotto addict or a drug addict. Tell
yourself the truth, I mean you got to be very sincere with yourself. If you can
farm, go farming and make a difference in Agriculture. Stop asking what your
country can do for you. Ask yourself what it is you can do for your country.
Firstly, be an ambassador of yourself and you will see that you will naturally
take your country to the world center of the world. I challenge every youth to
think out of the box and be innovative. A fool at forty can be a fool for the
rest of life but in the age of internet, if you are a fool at 20, then you
could start fooling yourself forever. There are many opportunities there on the
internet, grab it and became a solution rather than a liability.

Mr. Kaka Jnr (R) The GDA (M) and his pal, Dr. Baudy after the encounter in Lagos