Patrick Akinwuntan – The Man, Ecobank, His Legacies, The Future

On Monday 6^th December 2021, the Board of Ecobank Group announced from its headquarters in Lome, Togo the impending retirement of Mr. Patrick Akinwuntan as Managing Director and Regional Executive of Ecobank Nigeria, when he reaches the mandatory retirement age in January 2022.

Out-going Ecobank Nigeria MD Patrick Akinwuntan was appointed Managing Director of Ecobank Nigeria in July 2018, and he has rebuilt and repositioned the bank for growth in the Nigerian market, putting the business in Nigeria on the path to regaining its respect and transformation. During his tenure in Nigeria, Ecobank won several global, regional and national awards.

Patrick Akinwuntan started his career with Ecobank in 1996. He held various senior and executive management positions in over 25 years he spent with the Ecobank Group, during which he has been based in Ghana, Togo and Nigeria. Before his appointment as Regional Executive and Managing Director, Ecobank Nigeria, he was the Group Executive, Consumer Banking, where he was responsible for leading the Consumer Banking business across Ecobank’s global network of 39 countries, 35 of which are in Africa. He managed the Group’s digital transformation journey and has been instrumental in the development of the world-class digital products and services that Ecobank provides today.

Mr. Akinwuntan is a seasoned banker who also previously was on the Board of ETI as a Group Executive Director and held the positions of Group Chief Finance Officer of ETI, Group Executive Director Domestic Bank, Operations, Technology, Transaction and Retail Bank, including Executive Director, Retail Bank at Ecobank Nigeria among others. He was the pioneer Managing Director of eProcess S.A, the Ecobank Group’s technology service company, where he ensured the connectivity of all the Group’s operations across its vast footprint.

A Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (FCA), Akinwuntan also holds an MBA from Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife and is an alumnus of the senior executive program (SEP) of the Harvard Business School, an honorary Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (FCIB), Fellow of the Institute of Credit Administrators of Nigeria (FICA) and an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria (ACTI).

Patrick Akinwuntan, as Mr. Ecobank Nigeria for almost four years, after several other strategic positions in the Ecobank Group, talks, breathes, thinks, and even dreams Ecobank because he seems to have at his fingertips every information about the history, products, services, development and direction of the bank, aside from his vast knowledge of Nigeria’s and global financial and economic affairs.

So what next for him after January 2022 when he bows out as CEO of Ecobank Nigeria? Is it politics, farming, teaching, music? He speaks with Epa.com.ng.

 QUESTION: As you retire as CEO, Ecobank Nigeria, what would you consider as your legacy?

ANSWER: I work for Ecobank in Nigeria and that is very critical. I don’t start from seeing myself as CEO, Nigeria, I see myself as responsible for the Ecobank brand in Nigeria. So, I would like to see my contributions to delivering the Ecobank standard in terms of customer experience, good place to work, integrity, corporate governance, innovation. Promoting businesses in Nigeria to take advantage of Africa as one platform – that is how I would like to look at my contributions in my period of service in Nigeria.

Even though I operate within the geography, Nigeria, I remained and continue to operate as one of the leaders of Ecobank Group; and that’s part of the uniqueness of Ecobank to other banks – you get to go and do a geography role and you are responsible only in that geography. In Ecobank, you are responsible for deepening the Ecobank franchise in that geography, which means you still remain a member of the Ecobank Group leadership, it is a unique difference.

QUESTION: You are basically a champion of Ecobank, you practically talk everywhere about everything in Ecobank. What next when you leave Ecobank?

ANSWER: The beauty is that, when you look at the age of Ecobank now, at full operations, commercial operations, thirty-three years now and is still in full commercial operation, we are getting into an inflection point where, say over the last decade in particular, we now have also a crop of Ecobank alumni that remains Ecobank Ambassadors, in the vanguard for delivery of Africa arriving at its point of self-respect and taking its rightful place globally. I will be joining that league of Ecobank flag carriers, flying the flag of Africa and continue to follow through on the values for which we stand as an institution; seeing Africa as one market, supporting every part of the continent to operate in an interoperable manner, to realise the potentials that abound in our continent; be it in being a faculty for supporting young people to better understand Africa as one market and maximise the opportunities; be it in advisory role in institutions that seek to realise such potentials in various sectors; be it in Telecoms, be it in Financial Services, be it in Agric, be it in each of those concepts which are today increasingly becoming Pan-African concepts, you see it in education. Today it is standard to say your child is going to school in Ghana, or your child is going to school in Kenya, or in Senegal and you are in Nigeria. So, we actually have the breed of Pan-African students also coming through. So in every facet you pick in the arts, we have also a Pan-African focus. So my knowledge of Africa will always be available to support critical units that have a Pan-African view.

QUESTION: So, no going into farming or something?

ANSWER: No, that does not preclude going into farming, because there is farming for Africa also. It just means looking at, for instance, you mentioned farming, looking at how Agric is a Pan-African play; because you look at the level of imports and employment crises and balance of payment crisis and exchange rate challenges of Africa you can solve significantly with a Pan African view of agriculture. So if Nigeria is very good at rice and Ghana is very good at, just as an example plantain, why are we not, as Africa consolidating the scale effect of Nigeria and rice and consolidating this effect of Ghanaian in plantain and ensuring that that ensures Africa is self-sufficient in rice and plantain? Rather than importing rice from Thailand into Ghana, they import rice from Nigeria and rather than importing plantain chips from wherever, you import it from Ghana, because now it’s a common market the same way, I would buy plantain easily that comes out of Ijebu, sitting in Ilorin, and also sell beef from Ilorin to somebody in Ibadan. When you check the distance between Dakar and Lagos, Maiduguri is farther to Lagos than Dakar, but we still operate Nigeria as one country so, that knowledge can be used. And that’s how Ecobank has operated, and that’s where I think I have unique value that I will continue to provide.

Increasingly, I will pay a lot of attention to policy advocacy that supports the framework for those types of businesses and opportunities to thrive.

QUESTION: Retirement will hopefully provide you more time for family, music, sports like golf, etc?

ANSWER: Well, my love for music and my participation in music is constant. So I will certainly have a bit more time particularly for church music. I will devote more time to support talents in that area who can also make a commercial success in using their talent effectively. And also in terms of mentoring. A good balance between strict faith activity and also communication to the wider world. We know what music does.

I am an Arsenal fan and so I will certainly have more time to watch Arsenal. I love Arsenal but I am not expecting Arsenal to love me. I choose to love Arsenal. That’s the difference between Gunners and other clubs. It’s like parents and children – you don’t love your children only when they are on the high. Come rain, come sun, we are Gunners and we will go from one level to the other, positively.

The family, certainly. I will certainly have more time but I will still be travelling a lot. I love travelling and spreading the gospel of one Africa.  Clearly I’ll be doing that within Africa and outside Africa. I see myself working very close with graduate schools where I can bring the knowledge of Africa to the younger generation to really realise the potential. I look forward to that. I intend to remain active and in the social forums in Nigeria, encouraging good conduct, reminding people to participate, remembering that where the wise keep quiet, fools will rule them. It’s a concept that I strongly believe in. We can all analyse but at the end of the day, we should all participate in what is good for our community and good for our country. We are all stakeholders and we have to exercise our ownership and participate positively. As long as more people take a positive view and contribute, and good will triumph over evil, that’s my view. It’s only when the good keep quiet, that evil will triumph.

I will be very active. I will continue to be active not from a partisan standpoint but from encouraging everyone to participate in whatever is considered critical for the community. You need to participate.

(Interview conducted on Wednesday 19^th January, 2022 at EPAC, Victoria Island, Lagos)