By Ehi Braimah,
I joined The Platform live on Channels Television on Thursday October 1 to listen to inspiring conversations about Nigeria. What I heard from Dr. Emmanuel Emefienim, Founder and Managing Director/CEO of Premium Trust Bank, was much more than a motivational speech.
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It was a masterclass in resilience, ambition, leadership, relationships, knowledge, faith and the power of refusing to give up.
The Platform, organised by The Covenant Place under the leadership of Senior Paster Poju Oyemade, has become an important public conversation that brings Nigerians together around ideas, experiences and possibilities.
Held on May 1 and October 1 in a town-hall setting and televised live, it has consistently provided a platform for Nigerians to share stories that can inspire particularly the younger generation to believe in themselves and in their country.
Dr. Emefienim’s story deserves to be told beyond the walls of The Platform because it is not simply the story of one successful banker; it is a Nigerian story about what can happen when adversity meets determination. After completing his NYSC, Emefienim applied for 70 jobs.
Only four organisations, according to him, responded. He eventually joined Oceanic Bank at the age of 22.
At some point, he was transferred from Lagos to Asaba. His career subsequently took him to Savannah Bank in Port Harcourt, where he became a regional manager.
Then came the shock that could have destroyed everything. I mean, everything: his plans, big dreams and bright future.
One weekend, Emefienim travelled to Warri to spend time with his family. When he returned to work on Monday, he discovered that Savannah Bank had been liquidated. There were no members of staff waiting for him.
Instead, officials of the Central Bank of Nigeria and the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation were there. There had been no warning.
Suddenly, the man who had an official car and driver was without a job. He was married, in his 30s, and his wife was a civil servant. His professional world had collapsed almost overnight. What did he do? He did not give up.
His driver took him to Benin City. From there, he travelled to Lagos, using a public transport service, to see a manager at FSB, a bank that had previously offered him a job while he was still at Savannah Bank. He had declined the offer then.
Now, Emefienim needed the job, but the manager, obviously angry and wanted to have his pound of flesh back, ignored him and kept him waiting for three days.
It would have been easy to interpret the experience as humiliation and walk away. But Emefienim remained focused. Eventually, the manager saw him and offered him a job – but at a lower level.
He moved from senior manager to deputy manager and was posted to Yenagoa in Bayelsa State which he accepted as he had no choice at the time.
That decision contains a profound lesson: sometimes, starting again is not failure; it is strategy. There are moments in life when circumstances force us to take a step backwards so that we can eventually move forward.
The important thing is not the temporary position we occupy, or feelings of rejection experienced or disappointments that we face, but whether we can continue moving towards the destination.
Emefienim had a big dream. He recalled telling the Managing Director of Oceanic Bank and some colleagues that one day he would become the managing director of a bank himself. While the MD encouraged him to pursue his goal, his colleagues laughed at him.
His response is one of the most memorable lines from his presentation: when people don’t laugh at your dream, perhaps the dream is not big enough. That is a message Nigeria’s young people need to hear.
Too many young people allow their current circumstances to define their future, but the future does not necessarily resemble the present.
A young person who is struggling today may become an employer tomorrow, and someone rejected for a job may eventually build an institution that employs hundreds or thousands of people.
Emefienim’s own journey demonstrates this. He continued to rise through Equatorial Trust Bank and later Sterling Bank, following mergers and acquisitions in the Nigerian banking industry.
He rose through the ranks – AGM, DGM, GM and Executive Director – while continuing to acquire knowledge.
He attended Harvard Business School several times. But perhaps more importantly, he did not keep the knowledge to himself – he invested in people.
He personally sponsored some of his managers to also attend Harvard. When the time came for him to leave Sterling Bank and establish Premium Trust Bank, six of the seven managers he had trained agreed to join him.
That is a powerful definition of leadership. A leader is someone who reaches the top and helps others rise.
This is particularly important in Nigeria, where the quality of human capital will ultimately determine how competitive our economy becomes. Buildings, technology, capital and infrastructure matter, but people make institutions work.
Emefienim also spoke about relationships and networks as critical elements of success.
This is another lesson worth emphasising. Knowledge is important, but relationships create opportunities for knowledge to be applied.
Networks create access, partnerships and possibilities because nobody succeeds entirely alone.
His story also contains an important lesson about family resilience. After experiencing the trauma of losing his job without warning, he empowered his wife to start a business.
He wanted to ensure that his family would never again be placed in such a vulnerable position because one person’s employment had suddenly disappeared resulting in loss of income.
That was more than a financial decision – it was an act of foresight. Today, the story has come full circle. The young man who once submitted 70 applications looking for employment is now the founder and owner of a bank.
Premium Trust Bank, which commenced commercial banking operations as a regional bank in April 2022, has grown into a national banking institution with 35 branches.
Emefienim spoke proudly about its growth and profitability and its successful participation in the banking industry’s recapitalisation programme, raising N200 billion, the threshold for national banks, and achieving a historic milestone as one of Nigeria’s 10 most profitable banks.
There is something profoundly Nigerian about this story. Nigeria is often described in terms of its problems – unemployment, infrastructure deficits, insecurity, poverty, weak institutions and other challenges. These problems are real and should not be minimised.
But Nigeria is also a country of extraordinary human possibilities. Our greatest resource is not oil neither is it our large population; it is the capacity of Nigerians to create, innovate, adapt, build businesses, solve problems and compete. This is one of the central ideas behind my forthcoming book, How Naija can conquer the world.
The book is about Nigeria’s economic potential, global ambition and the strategies required to achieve greater prosperity. I argue that Nigeria’s success should not be measured simply by the size of its economy.
Instead, we should be concerned about rising incomes, productivity, exports, globally competitive companies, human capital and the ability to create value for the world.
Emefienim’s story illustrates several of these principles. He acquired knowledge, built relationships, invested in people, remained focused, executed consistently, understood his environment, adapted when circumstances changed, dreamed beyond his immediate reality, and remained anchored in faith.
His reference to what he calls “revelational knowledge” – spiritual insight and instruction he believes come from God – adds another dimension to his philosophy.
For him, formal education and professional experience are important, but they exist alongside faith and spiritual guidance.
There is another lesson here for Nigeria: we need more people who are prepared to build institutions rather than merely look for opportunities. When Nigerians build strong companies, they create jobs, and when they invest in people, they create human capital.
We have the capacity to develop globally competitive products and services for exports. Clearly, the moral of Emefienim’s story is that we should build institutions that survive beyond their founders and contribute to national prosperity.
This is how a nation moves from potential to prosperity.
Listening to Dr. Emefienim, I was reminded that Nigeria does not lack stories of courage, enterprise and achievement.
Perhaps what we lack is a sufficiently organised effort to tell these stories and convert them into a powerful national narrative.
We need to tell young Nigerians that setbacks are not destinies. An entrepreneur’s small business today can become tomorrow’s major institution.
We need to tell professionals that continuous learning matters; tell leaders that investing in people is one of the highest forms of leadership, and also tell the world that Nigeria is much more than the challenges that frequently dominate international headlines. Dr. Emmanuel Emefienim has done well.
From a young graduate searching for his first job, to a banker who survived the collapse of a major institution, got another job within four days, to a senior executive, and an entrepreneur who built his own bank, his journey is a powerful reminder of what determination can accomplish.
His story is not an invitation to ignore Nigeria’s problems, but he is simply saying we should confront them with courage.
Nigeria needs more dreamers – but also more doers. We need people who can dream big, acquire knowledge, build relationships, invest in others and execute with consistency.
That is how nations are built.
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Perhaps that is the deeper message of The Platform: Nigeria’s future will be created by Nigerians who believe that something better is possible – and then roll up their sleeves and build it.
