Reflection on Dr. Alex Otti and human capacity building

By UCHE NWOSU

It’s good to be blessed. It’s better to be a blessing. The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it and make some difference to justify that you have lived and lived well. Steel magnate Andrew Carnegie, in his assertion stated that “he who dies leaving behind many millions will pass away unwept, un-honored and unsung.”

Abia State is a very strange place where the future is as uncertain as the present. The gap between the rich and the poor is wider than the entire Sahara Desert. Social infrastructure is in a state of decay. The public health system collapsed long ago. Many of Abia sons and daughters that are brilliant and intelligent, who desire to further their education to higher level lack the means to do so.

I don’t know the financial strength of Dr. Alex Otti, but any man that would set aside fund in advance, that runs into hundreds of millions of naira for university scholarship scheme to support Abia State students from poor families or anyone in distress in the state and Nigeria, having weathered serious political storms to reshape Abia State political landscape; certainly has the milk of human kindness flowing through his veins. Dr. Alex Otti deserves special recognition and a word of gratitude for his generosity. By this recent singular act-floating a Foundation that has an Educational Scholarship Scheme Division, and similar gestures in the past, he seems to be changing the narrative about the art of giving and the need for a sense of community and philanthropy in Nigeria. It is not enough to give, but to give consistently and generously, without any expectation of reward or gain.

Dr. Alex Otti, last two weekend formerly unveil his Foundation (Alex Otti Foundation), where a division of his Foundation that is responsible for Educational Scholarship Scheme, provided the means for brilliant Abia Students from poor family background to run their degree programs; with the view to continue the scholarship program as long as he lives. We all know that the most vital benefits of higher education in the 21st century is the fact that it helps communities and societies operate smoothly and enhances personal lives. With this development in the State, it is obvious that in the next 10 years, over 300 poor families in Abia State would have at least one graduate- courtesy of Dr. Alex Otti Foundation.

Abia State is a place where even the rich are not sure of tomorrow. Talented people, distinguished professionals in various fields of endeavor end up becoming beggars, or destitute, not necessarily because they did not plan for their future or for unforeseeable accidents of life, but they suffer because the state often leaves its citizens stranded. The state routinely disappoints the citizens. The citizens are treated as if they are not human beings. This is why every act of kindness extended to poor Abia citizens is significant. It is not the amount that matters, but the very thought itself, the gesture that reminds us occasionally that in this pressure cooker of a society in which we live, you can still find a man who deems it expedient to accommodate the needy and less privileged in his annual budget, a concerned citizen who helps an accident victim, a cab driver who finds a document or some money forgotten by a passenger and returns it, or a security agent who does his work with the fear of God. Such persons are quite rare in these parts, and it is why we need a constant reminder that beyond the state or government, Abia is a state where we must continue to search for the meaning of existence, and the reasons for being human.

Dr. Alex Otti extending his Educational Scholarship Scheme to Abia and Nigeria university students reminds us of the big difference that we all can make, not in millions of Naira, but each man or woman in his own station or little way, according to his economic and material strength, through simple and possible gestures of kindness.

Dr. Alex Otti’s magnanimity in this direction is an act worthy of emulation by all. And as such, deserves great commendation.

Uche Nwosu
Political and Public Affairs Analyst.