Nduom bemoans running down of indigenous successful businessmen
The President and Chairman of Groupe Nduom, Dr Papa Kwesi Nduom, has expressed worry about running down of indigenous successful businessmen in the country instead of encouraging them to be more successful.
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He said it was unfortunate that instead of encouraging ambitious entrepreneurs to be successful, “they are hated for being ambitious” while measures were put in place to destroy their businesses.
“As a matter of fact I don’t know what is wrong with us. We punish those who are successful and give them negative tags to run them down,” he stated.
Dr Nduom was addressing students of the University of Energy and Natural Resources (UNER) in Sunyani.
Spirit of perseverance
He spoke on the topic: “Enhancing economic growth through entrepreneurship to promote national development.”
“We should rather find how successful entrepreneurs became successful. If they became successful through fraudulent means, then we have the right to criticise them; if they are on a right path then we should follow their example.”
He said it was important for students who wished to be entrepreneurs to have the spirit of perseverance and the ability to keep on working no matter the odds in order to stay in business.
Dr Nduom said even though it was not a bad thing to dream big, new entrepreneurs had to start from scratch, learn from their failures and keep on building on their successes.
He said it was not a bad idea for would-be entrepreneurs to work in other establishments and gain experience on the job before using their acquired knowledge to start their own businesses.
“A good employee will one day become a successful entrepreneur. If you steal from your employer or sleep on the job, how could you be able to supervise your own business to be successful?”
“If you are lucky to have somebody to employ you, you have to reward him with hard work and continue to dream that one day you can also establish your own business and employ others.”
Critical natural resource situation
Touching on the country’s energy and natural resources situation, Dr Nduom expressed worry that the country’s natural resources were rather making it poor instead of being rich.
“Years of mining in the country have not benefitted mining communities in the country,” he said as he compared the rickety buildings in some mining communities in Ghana such as Obuasi and the beautiful buildings in Johannesburg in South Africa, which is also a mining community.
Dr Nduom was of opinion that Ghana’s mineral resources should rather be left untapped if mining them would not bring any benefit to the country.
He, therefore, asked them to work hard to use their knowledge to change the status quo in the mining and energy sectors, stating thus: “Of what use will your education be if you do not become an agent of change in future as directors of our natural resource institutions.”
Dr Nduom attributed Ghana’s current energy and natural resources problems to financial inefficiency.
Think differently
Dr Nduom charged the youth to not only seek knowledge but strive to apply such acquired knowledge to solve the country’s critical problems and create wealth for themselves.
“We need to think differently if we aspire to make any impact in future. If national development will depend on us, then we have to think differently from how we are doing now,” he stated.
Dr Nduom encouraged students to live by their mission, vision and value to ensure that they acquired the required knowledge and experience to be successful in future.
He announced a scheme to reward best students of the university with GHC5,000.00 every year.
For her part, the Vice Chancellor of UNER, Professor Esi Awuah, said the university was working around the clock to enable its students to acquire the relevant knowledge that would enable them to become competent managers of the country’s energy and natural resources in the future.
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