Prolific People : Meet His Royal Highness, Prince Dr Y.F Bala Tonglele - A quintessential Industrialist and a Cerebral Giant!

“It doesn't matter what your pedigree is, who your family is or what degrees you have. What really matters is how you perform your job and how you produce results”-. Gracia Martore

By Chief Mike DE Cerutti Osagie

E :chiefcerrutti@gmail.com

HE is a man of many parts, and he means different things to different people His Royal Highness Prince Y.F. Bala Tonglele,-beyond being a humanist, an Africanist, a philanthropist, a quintessential industrialist and a cerebral giant, is the current Secretary General Friends of President Muhammadu Buhari In Diaspora, he is also the All PROGRESSIVE Peoples (APC) Coordinator in the London

 Currently in Nigeria in preparation for the grand 2019 Presidential election, WORLD LEADERS ONLINE magazine few days ago encountered him and we today present his robust profile as first in series of a most elaborate interview session

His Royal Highness Prince Y.F. Bala Tonglel was born in 1959 into the Tonglele family of the Kojana clan of Bwonpe in Mangu Local Government Area of Plateau State in the North Central Nigeria. He attended the Bwonpe Community Primary School in 1971 and completed in 1976 with an outstanding academic performance. He finished his primary school with As in all his papers. His Royal Highness maintained a first class position throughout his duration in the primary school. Armed with this impressive first school leaving certificate, His Royal Highness got admitted to Government Secondary School Pankshin in 1976.

 He was to replicate the same academic feat in GSS Pankshin by recording all As in his O level papers in 1981. He won prizes in French, Commerce and English. It was in GSS Pankshin that he demonstrated his leadership skills and competence when he served as the School Time Keeper from 1979 to 1980 and Food Prefect, Social Prefect and Deputy Head Boy concurrently from 1980 to 1981. It is interesting to note that in spite of the heavy burden of leadership imposed on HRH, he topped the 1981 graduating class in academic performance. His towering academic record was so impressive that the Plateau State Ministry of Education had to engage him as a French Teacher at Mangun Secondary School from 1981 to 1982. He was the youngest person ever to be appointed to teach in a Secondary School with Secondary School qualification at the time and this was essentially motivated by his immense cerebral prowess.

Realizing the vast potentials HRH was endowed with, the Plateau State Government in September 1982 awarded HRH an Overseas scholarship to study Management Planning and Development in England in the United Kingdom. He proceeded to Greenwich School of Management (GSM) in England from 1982 to 1989. He worked so hard to obtain his HND in March 1983. Still feeling insatiable, he got enrolled for a Postgraduate Diploma from the Chartered Institute of Marketing and finished in November 1983. No sooner had he completed the Postgraduate Diploma than he was enrolled for an MBA programme in 1984 and graduated with exceptional grades in 1985 with his thesis titled “Strategic Corporate Planning for Word Economy. Desirous of reaching the pinnacle of his academic pursuit, HRH registered for a PhD programme in 1986 and successfully finished within the prescribed three years time frame. His doctoral thesis was on “Factors affecting Economic Performance in Nigeria, A Revival Pattern.” His thesis was adjudged the most painstakingly researched and the most authoritative on the Nigerian economy.

It is hardly controvertible that HRH is a man who is generously endowed with a fertile, imaginative and productive mind. He has invested considerable amount of his time in writing and publishing articles on a wide range of developmental issues.

 For instance, he has written and submitted a proposal to General Abdulsalami Abubakar (Rtd) on “The Commercial Proposal for the Reactivation of Nigeria Airways” in 1998. He has also written “Making Nigeria the Textile Capital of Africa, 2003; Nigeria: A roadmap to Industrialization, 2003; Mass Transit Tata Buses Corporate Programme for Nigeria, 2003 and a host of others too numerous to mention here. Our distinguished Guest Lecturer had also spearheaded the purchase of Boeing 747 newly constructed Aircraft for Nigeria in 1999. In addition to all these cerebral work, HRH is a community oriented person with impressive record of community related engagements. He set up a community development programme, a limited liability company called Golden Shield Security Group based in London.

The company employs and empowers the African community in the United Kingdom with the opportunity for self-employment. It is on record that the company has trained over 400 directors who now run their own independent businesses in the United Kingdom. He has interviewed over 100,000 people in the last 20 years and has employed some 28,000 staff over these years most of whom are Africans or of multicultural origins. He has also developed a number of unique business and security programmes for many capital cities in Europe and the Middle East.

Impressed by the enormous contributions of HRH to the enterprise of development in the UK, the British Government granted him leave to settle in the UK from student under the ‘investors in Britain’ category. He was the first African to be granted this leave. HRH is member of Board of Governor of his Alma mata, the Greenwich School of Management, a member of the Council of the International Professional Security Association and a member of the Active Committee of the Small Business Network in UK.

HRH felt challenged by the ugly development in Jos in 2001 and the consequences of this for human security. He spearheaded the Peace and Reconstruction Programme after the Jos crisis of 2001. He invested generously personal resources into the resettlement of displaced persons from Jos to Kano. He also single handedly printed more than 10,000 customized AO Nigerian Maps with multicultural colours representing peace and unity which were widely distributed to schools and colleges in the state. These maps are still being used as teaching aids in schools for peace and unity within Plateau State. This effort contributed significantly to the restoration of peace in the state. It was on account of this that the State Council of Chiefs and Emirs considered him worthy of the honour to hold the office of the State Crown Prince. Consequently, in 2005, he was conferred with the prestigious title of the State Crown Prince of Plateau State by the 10 first class Chiefs and Emirs

 In 2009, HRH was carefully evaluated and considered for inclusion amongst the first 1,000,000 British citizens to be listed in the prestigious ‘Who is who’ of the British Business Elites. On August 9, 2009 at the 20th anniversary celebrations of Golden Shield Security Group, HRH was awarded the 2009 Commonwealth Youth Award of Excellence. Let me expose you a little to the social life of our distinguished Guest Lecturer. He is happily married with disciplined and responsible children.

As  an international figure who is endowed with multiple skills, competencies and above all, an uncommon cerebral potency. He has earned national and international recognition on account of his good mix of theory and praxis which has turned him into an effective investor, industrialist, a nationalist, pan Africanist, a compassionate global actor, an effective peace maker and the pride of the world. He is indeed, a role model for the youth across the globe in general and Nigeria in particular.