08/07/2024
We will bring about social transformation and sustainable developement - Dr. Ogochukwu Soludo
Dr. Ogochukwu Saludo of Advanced Development Solutions Initiative (ADSI) says his organisation will bring about social transformation through cooperative advantage. He made the statement while speaking to newsmen during the GCC 2024 at Abuja· Excerpts:
Let's meet you formally
My name is Dr. Ogochukwu Soludo. I am the initiator and president of ADSI Multipurpose Society Limited. ADSI stands for Advanced Development Solutions Initiative.
We are interested in harnessing the cooperative advantage for grassroots mobilization, social transformation, and sustainable development. It is our persuasion that we will do better together instead of running a loop. But we also know that for people to come together to be able to make a meaningful impact, there must be the dynamics of good corporate governance. There must be the sincerity of purpose. There must be the credibility of the leadership. There must be transparency in the process. There must be prudence in management. And there must be, you know, equitable template for redistributing the surplus of what is jointly owned by the group.
That's really what we set out to do in order to change the narrative. Because hitherto, it would appear that people largely see life as a game of mutual deceit. It's almost like a dog-eat-dog economy. Everyone trying to cheat one another. And so trust suffers as a consequence. So it becomes very hard for people to come together. But from the empirical evidence shows that our own business model has never produced sustainable development. And so we recommend that actually the best we can do is your copy of God's idea. God in creation only set the system in operation because if the world began, the sun has never stopped rising in the east and setting in the west. 12 hours of daylight, 12 hours of darkness, making a complete day.
The rainy season follows dry season. And this physical material universe actually is governed by the law of sowing and ripping. The rainy season equates with the season of planting, dry season equates with the season of harvest. So these are the things that we thought we needed to do. Because essentially, the developed world, what they are doing better than us is that they are modeling, they are copying God in building systems and institutions. While we sabotage systems, destroy institutions for selfish gain.
But we want to situate things properly and make a difference. So we target to build the most formidable mass movement for social transformation and sustainable development in Nigeria.
What we want to do in terms of social transformation is to change the way people think and act, largely from changing from this manifest selfish interest to placing service above self. And so within the past 20 months since we started, we've done quite a lot.
Currently, we have a total registered membership of 1,384 as at this morning, and we are targeting actually building a membership of 10 million, I mean before the year 2030. And what we are really doing is to harness resources through our membership, which we invest wisely across value chains in agriculture, in industry, in commerce, in transport, in logistics, in mines, every aspect that is viable.
And so if you look at here, these are some of the products from our stable. This is a soursop tea, this is very good for prostate in men, and it's also good for preventing cancer. Then, of course, here is our hibiscus tea. It's good for balancing blood pressure. And here is our Ekwenche. And this is clinically formulated remedy for diabetes, which has been proven to be very, very effective.
And then, of course, food. We are talking about food security. So we are already doing some processing. This is poundo yam. This is plantain flour. Well, this is antiviral tea. This was developed during the COVID era; while people were trying to scare people - scaremongering.
We thought we needed to bring solution to that. So we produce this to help boost people's immunity and help to prevent them coming down with that. And there is asserted spices as well. But then what is really very special, our own contribution to food security, is that as a cooperative society, we have decided to take a lease hold of 30 hectares of farmland, you know, in Anambra states, in a local government called Ayamelum. And currently, as we talk, we are doing eight hectares. We are doing eight value chains, rather. We are doing seven hectares of castor beans. We are doing five hectares of yam, five hectares of cocoyam, five hectares of cassava. We are doing four hectares of rice. We are doing four hectares of beans. We are doin g four hectares of groundnuts. We are doing three hectares of corn, or maize, as the case may be. That's why we are doing currently. And then, of course, I must also say that we are going to global outcry about...
I don't know what the scientists say about genetically modified whatever. My own conviction, I am a missionary. I am suspicious of the entire agenda of that, because I see it becoming a twenty-five-century slave trade, because by the time individuals would develop a particular kind of seed, different from the one God created, and then they go and have it, what do you call it, registered in their name, and then they become the sole suppliers in the world. There is nothing worse than that, that is purely advanced level wickedness.
Because people have found out that genetically modified seed does not replenish, once you plant it, then it ends there. It destroys the land, because you can't even plant the original ones thereafter - it won't produce. Then we will all be at the mercy of somebody somewhere.
With the kind of implications what is going on in the world, it will mean that tomorrow, if you are not a gay inclined, then you will not get food. Well, I am opposed to it, and we are doing something about it.
Part of what we are doing in a wonderful way is to preserve our seed, the natural one, the original one, the one that God created, that our ancestors survived with. And by the way, I think that Africans need to think, because the truth is that God created people and defined the boundaries of their habitation, and He supplied what they need to survive in their environment.
Most of the times we use money to go and import what we don't even need, which impoverishes us. Look at natural things. You see, with all the things that they are doing now, we have had to use this. This is pure thing. If I tell you what it is, you will be shocked. There are people that have had to cut toes because of diabetic ulcer. But with this, within thirty days, the wond healed. it is sad that the toe didn't regrow. Assuming we met them before they chopped off their legs, we would use natural remedy, but very soon, I am sure, the pharmaceutical world will come after us because they don't want any care.
It's palliative, so that we will make for business. People must understand that there is a whole lot of, it is the mystery of deception that is at work in the world. We are not really as helpless as we... as they make us to believe. If we only harness what we have. We can meet the world halfway.
There is so much the world has no answer for. But the answer is found in nature. And then, of course, rather than allow those things today, we will try to manipulate the process, buy off government officials in order to close down those things so that they continue do business.
No. If, for instance, with the projections we just made, we figured out that by the time we build a member, the greatest asset for us is just the numerical strength. By the time we build a membership length of 10 million, that would be our cruising altitude. Because with the 5,000 membership registration, each person pays to join our group, we would have generated 50 billion by default.
And with our annual dues of 12,000 per person per year, we would have generated about 120 billion per annum. And because we are not inclined to, it's not a game of mutual deceit for us, it is to harness these things, invest wisely, you know, manage prudently, multiply and redistribute equitably. That's the whole process. That's exactly our own idea of how to pursue. So we're not going to be a domestic world bank, or federal, or state, or local government. We will only trust God that at least once we build up the numbers, we will have the resources to do what we've got to do. Wait for us, and in the next few years, we are going to become the most formidable mass movement for social transformation in Nigeria, if not in Africa.
Thank you.
