Arunma Oteh: The rejected stone

                                                           
ARUNMA  Oteh, the much-maligned immediate past Director-General of Nigeria’s Security and Exchange Commission, SEC, has just assumed duties at the World Bank as its Vice President and Treasurer. Oteh’s appointment was announced on Friday 24, July 2015, by the World Bank President, Jim Yong Kim who enthused: “I am pleased to announce the appointment of Arunma Oteh as VP and Treasurer of the World Bank. Ms. Oteh was selected for this position through an international competitive search.” Her appointment, said Kim, is effective from September 28, 2015.

Oteh’s appointment excites me for three reasons. She is a Nigerian. She is a woman. But the most exciting is that it vindicates all those who believed in her in the midst of one of the most vicious humiliation meted out on a public officer in his/her fatherland.

I first met Oteh on the pages of  Vanguard  Newspapers when the newspaper invited her from her Tunis base at the African Development Bank Group, AfDB, where she was the Vice President, Corporate Services, to deliver a high profile lecture in Nigeria. After reading her paper, I regretted not attending the lecture.

Beautiful. Elegant. Sure – footed. Meticulous, intelligent, brilliant, and not given to frivolity, Oteh is a cocktail of a total woman. I longed to meet her. Then, as fate would have it, months later, I met her physically at the Federal Polytechnic Nekede, Owerri, where both of us were honoured with the Fellowship of the Institution. Before we were bestowed with the honour, Oteh delivered another beautiful lecture which had the students on their feet, cheering and applauding.

When I went over to congratulate her, she was humble, and full of humility. We chatted like two long lost friends. That was where Oteh and I exchanged phone numbers. You can imagine my joy when former President Goodluck Jonathan appointed her the Director General of SEC, thus, bringing her back to her fatherland. In doing that, she was expected to bring her expertise into reviving Nigeria’s, almost, dead Capital Market. Her profile fitted the bill, and so did her carriage.

Prior to coming home to boss the SEC, her job as the VP AfDB, Corporate, included human resources, information, technology, and institutional procurement. For five years – 2001 to 2006 – she led AfDB’s fund-raising and capital market, world-over. According to Kim’s press release, “Earlier roles at the AfDB, which she joined in 1992, included trading room management, investment portfolio coverage, and public sector lending. She also held other positions in capital markets and lending during the course of her career at the AfDB.”

So, Oteh’s home-coming, to her fatherland, to put on display what she had done for Africa at the AfDB was a big deal. She went about it meticulously and courageously, not minding, excuse this cliché, whose ox was gored. She began by cleaning the capital market, and showing dead woods the exit door. In doing that, she stepped on very big toes.

For some people, hard work, competence and efficiency are a  no-no. As SEC boss, she exhibited those, and that was the beginning of her problem. Her carriage, beauty and brilliance did not help matters. To some people, “she is but a woman who must be conquered.” And they went about it in a most shameless manner.

Where she was accommodated, briefly, at the Hilton Hotel, Abuja, they went snooping, even in the thrash basket in her suite. They compiled her menu everyday and, what it cost. If she entertained visitors in her capacity as the SEC boss, they added up the number of cups of tea and/or coffee they drank, as well as cakes and/or other snacks they ate, and compiled the bills. Then, they inflated them, calling her extravagant.

At SEC, her very serious work ethics were her undoing. She was accused of high-handedness, amongst others, because she would not compromise standards. The last straw was her ordeal at the National Assembly where every effort was made to not only intimidate her, but to rubbish her. During an “ordinary session” to confirm a couple of things before the House of Representatives Committee on Capital Market, some members of the Committee, led by the then Chairman, Herman Hembe, reduced it to a humiliation of Oteh.

They insisted she was not qualified to head SEC; that she didn’t have the experience or competence. Their aim was to intimidate her, and make her grovel before them. But you intimidate Oteh at your own peril. Angered by the condescending manner she was treated, she hit back, accusing      the Chairman of corruption and certain behaviours beneath his position as an Honourable member.

As for her qualification? She flaunted her CV before them to the applause of those who watched it live on television. She told them she graduated, top of her class, in Computer Science at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, and had her Masters in Business Administration from the Harvard University. Then, she flaunted the portfolio she managed at AfDB. Those grilling her watched open-mouthed, taken-aback, and too confused to say anything coherent.

After Oteh’s  performance,  everybody became cautious. Her penalty was the zero – allocation in the budget for SEC, after a failed pressure on Jonathan to sack her. That zero-allocation inspired her to keep SEC  on track. But, it no doubt led to the non-renewal of her tenure as SEC DG. Now, it is this same woman who Nigerians tried hard to rubbish that the World Bank has found worthy for this high profile appointment after a thorough search.

She neither lobbied for it, nor got it through “bottom power”, the cross always hung on the neck of every successful career women in Nigeria.    Her competence gave her the job.

No wonder the World Bank President, Kim, was effusive in his commendation of Oteh, while announcing her appointment. As the VP and Treasurer of the World Bank, Oteh will manage and lead a large and diverse team responsible for managing more than $150 billion in assets. Her top priority, Kim revealed, among others, will be to maintain the World Bank’s global reputation as a prudent and innovative borrower, investor and risk manager.

For the records, there are many Otehs in Nigeria. But they are destroyed by their country men and women as soon as they start “shining.” We derive joy in pulling down our compatriots, thus, running down our country before the world.    Oteh’s case is a classic example of the Biblical prophet not recognised at home, but worshipped abroad. No response could have been sweeter for her envious critics than this very appointment. It is an unequivocal endorsement on her competence. And a lesson for  bad belles!