Adenuga Bags Silverbird’s Man of the Year Award

Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr. (CON), chairman Globacom Limited has won the 2009 Silverbird Man of the Year Award.
He polled over 75 percent of the votes sent in by text messaging.
Dr. Adenuga was nominated for Globacom’s successful completion of the sophisticated trans-Atlantic submarine optic fibre cable which connects Africa to Europe and America and the nationwide optical fibre cable that connects over 40 cities in Nigeria and is reputed to be Nigeria’s largest OFC network.
Others nominated alongside Adenuga are Godswill Akpabio, governor of Akwa Ibom State; Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, governor, Central Bank of Nigeria; Odein Ajumoobia, minister of state (Petroleum); and Alhaji Danjuma Goje, governor of Kebbi State.
The Silverbird Man of the Year award was initiated in 2005 and was conceived to celebrate the Nigerian who, in the past year, positively touched the lives of other Nigerians the most.
Former winners are Prof Dora Akunyuli, minister of Information and Communications; Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, former minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT); Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC); and Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, governor of Edo State.
Dr. Adenuga is believed to be Africa’s leading business icon. The latest honour came on the heels of recent similar awards including the Telecoms Man of the Year 2009 he won at the prestigious Nigerian Information Technology and Telecommunications Awards (NITTA) and the Compass Newspaper Man of the Year Award.
The Globacom Chairman is being celebrated for his major contributions to the growth of the telecoms industry in Africa, including a fast roll out beyond the borders of Nigeria where Glo started its operations, the deployment of a submarine cable from Lagos through other major African countries to Europe and America and the building of a robust and innovative pan-African network.
He was praised for always breaking new grounds in telecommunications investments and technology acquisition.
NITTA in particular noted that the businessman extraordinaire made Globacom the first telecoms firm in the region to commercially launch the 3G network and the first single company to lay an undersea cable from Africa to Europe with dedicated extension to the US.
Dr. Adenuga, it was noted, had taken Glo to Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana and the Republic of Benin, thereby setting the tempo of competition in the region, which would automatically raise the quality of service to international standard.
He was also commended for bringing a lot of exciting innovations into the telecoms industry and for growing Globacom at an unprecedented pace.
From Multimedia Messaging to Glo Mobile Internet, Vehicle Tracking, Blackberry and 3G services, Globacom has been in the forefront of introducing unique Value Added Services into the Nigerian telecommunications industry, earning in the process the sobriquet of Nigeria’s most innovative network.