Tell us bit about yourself, when were you born and where did you begin your early education?

I was born on the 4th of June 1977 in Victoria Island, Lagos where my father was serving as an officer of the Nigerian Airforce, having just been transferred from Kano. My primary school education started at Porterhalls Primary School at Ikeja, Lagos and having attending that school for a while, I moved to several other primary schools in Lagos (laughs). Actually, I attended about 5 primary schools because my father was constantly being transferred to different locations and he moved with the family on every single occasion.

Tell us bit about yourself, when were you born and where did you begin your early education?

I was born on the 4th of June 1977 in Victoria Island, Lagos where my father was serving as an officer of the Nigerian Airforce, having just been transferred from Kano. My primary school education started at Porterhalls Primary School at Ikeja, Lagos and having attending that school for a while, I moved to several other primary schools in Lagos (laughs). Actually, I attended about 5 primary schools because my father was constantly being transferred to different locations and he moved with the family on every single occasion.

The continuation of this interview will depend on your response to this next question. What football team do you support? I hope it is not Arsenal.

(Laughs) Yes indeed, I have a team that I follow diligently and it happens to be a team that my entire family supports too. I support Chelsea; my interest in the team started due to my early exposure to the team, by virtue of the fact my father was undertaking training in Chelsea, London and we lived in that area. It was the first football team we went to watch with my family and therefore I started supporting the team since then. However, the first indigenous team that I was exposed to was BCC Lions of Gboko and they remained very dear to me until the dissolution of the team a few years back.

Did you ever think that one day you will be working with your father?

Interestingly enough, I never did! However this is not the first time I am working with my father. The first time I started working for him, was after my secondary school education (i.e., before gaining admission into university). At the time, my father asked me to work with him, as his personal assistant (PA) in our family’s private business. Every morning I would go out with him to various business engagements and functions.

At that period, I found it quite frustrating because I was a young adventurous man, who had other interests and was keen to understand life but here I was taking up the responsibilities of more mature men instead of hanging out with my friends (Laughs). However, the experience helped me to redirect and establish my focus –giving me important business and life skills for the future.

After working with him as his PA for several years, I didn’t expect that he’d call me up again to work with him in this capacity, so like most people, it came to me as a surprise when he appointed me as the Special Adviser (SA) on special duties.

Being the occupant of such an important office (special adviser to the governor on special duties), can you tell our audience what your job role entails?

Well, the special duties portfolio in a fascinating one and it was the perfect one for me because this office empowers me to monitor and evaluate the implementation of policies and projects across the state and advise the Governor on progress, challenges and breakthroughs. Specifically, I undertake the monitoring and evaluation of virtually every department, ministry and government agency in the state either as assigned by the governor or as may be deemed necessary.

As you can gather, this is a huge amount of responsibility because I get to work with a variety of people whom hitherto I may not have had the chance of working with. And being a team player, the role suits me very much because it affords me the opportunity to drive individuals and agencies towards specified goals and targets.

I have found this appointment very fascinating, interesting and educational because I am involved in many different developmental projects from large construction projects to human capital development and financial management. All these projects have given me a lot of experience and an opportunity to contribute positively to the development of plateau state.

Your appointment as the special adviser to the Governor on special duties was greeted with sharp criticisms from opposition politicians, however now that you have established your pedigree, what do you have to tell your critics?

One thing I will say is that truly when I was appointed into this position, nobody gave me a chance; many people did not show any interest in what I could contribute. The only words the majority of people had for me, were sharp criticisms –and my only fault was that I was the Governor’s son. However this reaction gave me the determination and impetus to prove myself. I have also learnt that everyone deserves a chance to prove him or herself before being condemned because all the success stories that litter the globe are products of opportunity.

Even elected governors have to be given an opportunity to deliver on promises before it ever happens. So I think when someone is given an opportunity to serve in a public office, we should rally round and support them and after we have supported them and they disappoint us, then we can begin to criticize or castigate them but until then we should always give people the chance to see what they can contribute.

Governor Jonah David Jang has been described by many, as legendary, visionary, strong minded, focussed and forthright. However, as one of the people closest to him, could you give us an insight into the person of the governor and what it is like to work with him?

The Governor is definitely all the things you’ve said. He is a man full of experience and has made enormous impact in human capital development and all walks of life. Working with him has been interesting; it hasn’t been difficult for me to make a clear distinction between him being my father and being my boss, because he always draws the line sharply. When its time to talk family matters, we sit and talk family and when its time to work, am not treated any differently to other colleagues and that has exposed me to the work ethics and standards he represents. It is no easy feat to work with a man like that, because he is so driven, goal oriented and pushes you to the limit to produce results.

Sometimes it is easy to feel overwhelmed by the whole experience, but then you quickly realise it is good training for you and you don’t want to disappoint yourself or your boss. Most of us in the team have been able to catch up with such intense demands, however it has not been so easy because when you sit down in an executive council chamber discussing policy issues with an experienced man like the governor. A lot of times he allows us to debate issues and when we have finished, he says “I have an idea as follows”; and once he puts forward his idea, you realise the ideas you were putting forward the whole time was ‘rubbish’. His ideas come with such wisdom and experience that it makes some us realise how lucky we are to be working with such a man. The beauty of working with the governor is that he is very welcoming of new ideas and he will give everyone an audience to present their ideas liberally and once you present a superior argument on an issue, he happily accepts it. Having said that, the Governor is a very knowledgeable person and will ask a lot of questions and probe every idea or advise presented and this challenges one to do better research and background checks before coming to him. He usually asks “why should we do it as you have suggested?” and he debates with you back and forth on the issue until you come forth with a convincing response before he accepts your position.

This administration has achieved so much and you have been part of a lot of it, what is your proudest achievement?

When I look at how much this administration has achieved, it is difficult for me to name a particular one as my favourite. We have touched on education, health, infrastructure and human capital development and much more. I am proud of all that we have achieved because when we took charge of affairs in plateau, a lot of sectors were yearning for attention and although we have not been able to touch on all areas to be honest, we have done the best we can and are hoping that successive administrations can touch on other areas. However I am proud of all we have been able to touch on. I am not yet satisfied until we have been able to complete all projects started then I will be happy and proud because all these are achievements in progress and I will rather finish everything up by the 29th of May 2015 and we can tell the people of plateau that these are the things we were able to complete as projects for the state.

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