AFRIPOL.ORGIDEAS
HAVE CONSEQUENCES
PEOPLE IN THE NEWS:
Adebayo Ogunlesi -
POWERFUL BLACK EXECUTIVE
Adebayo Ogunlesi 48, is the managing director and head of global
projects for Credit Suisse First Boston Corp. This Nigeria native is
overseeing “CSFB's $2.8 billion investment-banking division and has
engineered financing for some of the biggest energy projects throughout the
world. His firm, Credit Suisse First Boston, under Ogunlesi's direction,
helped AES acquire generation assets from Edison International in California
with financing in the $725 million area. Ogunlesi's division helped Texaco
and Mission Energy raise about $400 million for Tri Energy in Thailand and
worked with the Polsky Group to raise $100 million for the Androscoggin
Power Project in Maine. He is also working with InterGen out of the United
Kingdom and Hong Kong to finance the Mezhiou Wan power project in China and
helping sponsors raise capital for projects in India, Mid-East and US .
Nigerian-born Ogunlesi graduated from Oxford University with first class
honors. When he matriculated at the Law School, the student body's
international composition included only him, an Iranian, and a Saudi
Arabian. His hypothesis is that Harvard was targeting non-Americans from
oil-rich countries -perhaps with hopes of future gifts. While Ogunlesi has
not returned to Nigeria, he has become amazingly successful in business. He
spoke of his pursuit of a business degree as something unplanned and
undertaken to help him "get over his fear of numbers." In looking back on
the law and business school experiences, Ogunlesi recounts taking a
"decidedly light load" at HBS. Meanwhile, he was an Editor of the Law Review
at the Law School, from where he graduated magna cum laude.
Upon graduation, Ogunlesi was a clerk to Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall
of the United States Supreme Court. He subsequently joined the New York law
firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore as an attorney in the corporate practice group.
Ogunlesi at the top-shelf New York City law firm Cravath, Swain & Moore,
jumped at the chance to advise First Boston on a Nigerian gas project.
Success in that effort landed him a better job at First Boston (which was
acquired by Credit Suisse in 1997). For First Boston he worked in project
finance, brokering deals in which lenders finance assets like oil refineries
and mines and are repaid with revenues generated by those enterprises.
Since joining First Boston in 1983, Mr. Ogunlesi has advised clients on
strategic transactions and financings in a broad range of industries,
including oil and natural gas, petrochemicals, power generation, mining,
natural resources and infrastructure. He work has taken place in North and
South America, the Caribbean, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
Ogunlesi has also been a lecturer at Harvard Law School and the Yale School
of Organization and Management, where he taught a course on transnational
investment projects in emerging countries. Nineteen years later, Ogunlesi
began to lead Credit Suisse First Boston through this most challenging
investment banking environment.
Ogunlesi has lived in New York for 20 years and is active in volunteer work.
But he also cultivates his ties to Africa. He informally advises the
Nigerian government on privatization. And last summer Manute Bol, the 7-ft.
7-in. former NBA center, visited Ogunlesi in his Park Avenue office, seeking
donations for a charitable foundation in Bol's homeland, Sudan. The 5-ft.
9-in. Ogunlesi walked Bol around the hallways, introducing him to junior
staff. It was just another day in the Bayosphere.”
Ogunlesi has been recognized in glowing terms by many elite magazines in USA
as the :
7th Most Powerful Black Executive by Fortune Magazine (2003).
Global Influentials - TIME Magazine (2002).
25 hottest Blacks in wall street - Black enterprise Magazine (2006)
DR. JOHN ODERA AGWUNOBI
- ASSISTANT SECRETARY
Dr. Agwunobi
Dr. Agwunobi is a Nigerian American, a medical doctor and the
current Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services (Health) of United
States of America. Before this appointment in 2005 by President Bush, Dr.
Agwunobi served as Secretary and State Health Officer at the Florida
Department of Health. Previously, he served as Vice President of Medical
Affairs and Patient Services at the Hospital for Sick Children in
Washington, DC.
As a pediatrician, Dr. Agwunobi has practiced medicine in rural, inner city
and suburban communities. He received his medical degree from the University
of Jos, Nigeria. He received his first master's degree from Georgetown
University and his second master's degree from Johns Hopkins University.
KWATSI ALIBARUHO: FLIGHT DIRECTOR, NASA
Kwatsi Alibaruho
Kwatsi Alibaruho is the first African-American
NASA flight director. He is of Uganda ancestry.
Alibaruho's father, economist Dr. George Alibaruho, is from Uganda, while
his mother, Dr. Gloria Alibaruho, is from USA. His siblings were born in
Uganda, Africa.
"I caught the 'science bug' very early from watching science fiction
programs, and I wanted to learn about real science," Alibaruho said,
reacting to his early interest in science and maths.
In this position, Alibaruho is responsible for managing and executing space
shuttle flights and international space station expeditions. He will lead
and orchestrate planning and integration activities with flight controllers,
payload customers and international space stations partners. Since joining
NASA in 1995, Alibaruho has served as a flight controller and group leader
in the space station life support systems group and deputy chairman of the
operations committee for the orbital space plane source evaluation board. He
is the recipient of the Rotary National Award for Space Achievement Stellar
Award 2001 and the Engineer of the Year Award 2001 from the National
Technical Association.
He received a bachelor of science degree in avionics from the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT). Alibaruho lives in League City, Texas, with
his wife Macrecia.
SENATOR BARACK OBAMA: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Barack Hussein Obama is
United States of America senator since January 2005. Obama is a
Kenyan-American, the first black male to become a Democratic party senator,
and the third black male senator in America since reconstruction. His
father, Dr. Obama , a Harvard trained economist is from Kenya and his
mother, a USA citizen. Just like his father, Senator Obama attended Harvard
University and received a Law degree. Before his present position, he was a
state senator in Chicago and a professor at Chicago University Law school.
Obama graduated from Columbia University in 1983, and moved to Chicago in
1985 to work for a church-based group seeking to improve living conditions
in poor neighborhoods plagued with crime and high unemployment. In 1991,
Obama graduated from Harvard Law School where he was the first African
American editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Senator Obama Barack is married to Michelle and they have two daughters. His
keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and his political
charisma has established him as a likely future US presidential candidate.