Opinion
Exemplars of Greatness: The Indefatigable Cosmas Maduka
By Tolulope A. Adegoke
“With courage, you will dare to take risks, have the strength to be compassionate, and the wisdom to be humble. Courage is the foundation of integrity.” – Mark Twain
Indeed, courage is grace under pressure. Cosmos Maduka’s story is particularly instructive to youths across the world. It reveals that there isn’t just hope for them, but that there are countless opportunities that they can exploit and maximise to their advantage.
Maduka was born in 1958, in Jos, Nigeria to Mr and Mrs Peter and Rose Maduka. In 1962, at the age of four, tragedy struck, with the passing of his father. With the poor and pitiable status of his family’s finances, he was faced with no other choice than to start providing the basic necessities of life for himself. At the age of seven, he withdrew from primary school at Elementary 3 and started assisting his mother in hawking akara (fried bean-cake) in Plateau, Jos.
In 1970, when Maduka was twelve years old, his uncle who resided in the Ebute Metta area of Lagos, took him to serve as an automobile apprentice in his auto shop located at No 88 Griffith Street, close to Oyingbo Bus stop. Since the uncle himself had no place of his own to stay, he usually slept at his friend’s place, while Maduka slept in the shop at the end of each day.
Not long after he resumed work, young Maduka, through his diligence, dedication and honesty, had totally won his uncle’s trust. This made his uncle to give him larger and more sensitive responsibilities he would not naturally have given anyone, including travelling alone to make purchases on his uncle’s behalf from Nnewi. In fact, at the age of 14, he was sent to work at one of the company’s branches in Sokoto in northern Nigeria.
Sadly, however, after absenting himself from work at a time to attend a church camp programme without his uncle’s permission, his relationship with his uncle fell apart. The event caused his uncle to immediately terminate his apprenticeship, and to subsequently settle him with the paltry sum of 200 naira (not up to a dollar now). The little sum was given to punish him at the time.
With his settlement, Maduka founded an auto spare parts business called “The Maduka Brothers”, with his brother. Unfortunately, the business soon collapsed as the two parted ways due to ideological differences. Fortunately, however, the business had earned him an additional 100 naira. So, with just 300 naira in capital, Maduka decided to have another trial at entrepreneurship. He started a new business as the sole proprietor. He began to buy and sell motorcycle spare parts from Boulous Industries.
Maduka soon found that the major product that was giving him a lot of returns was Boulous’ new innovation – motorcycle crash bars. Consequently, he began to buy several of them and would remove the address of Boulos from the carton so that people would not know where he was buying from. Within a short period, his capital had risen from 300 naira to 3,000 naira. At the age of 19, Maduka decided to get married to a beautiful woman, named Charity. A short while after his marriage, he started importing products. Sadly, misfortune struck when he received wrong consignment, leading to a huge loss. This loss led him into several debts, and his landlord whom he had owed several months’ rent ended up locking his shop.
With nothing in hand, Maduka brought out the bathroom scale he had received as a gift during his wedding, took it to the market, and started to charge 10 kobo from everyone who checked their weight. This daily routine seriously distressed his wife, as she considered what her husband was going through, which contrasted with their previous comfortable state.
After saving up a little capital, Maduka teamed up with a friend of his, Dave, to start a new business called CosDave. Not long after, however, their new business partnership fell apart due to disagreements. This new breakup prompted Maduka to start yet another business called Coscharis. The name Coscharis was formed by the combination of his name, Cosmas, and that of his wife, Charity.
Maduka’s big break finally came when in the same year, 1982, the Nigerian government granted ten vehicle companies import licences, and his Coscharis Motors was selected. Since then, his company has continued to grow sporadically, with several branches around Nigeria. Today, his personal net worth, according to an interview he had with Forbes Africa in 2015, is over $500 million US dollars and counting.
As of 2016, Coscharis Motors was not just one of the largest automobile dealers in Nigeria, but was also the exclusive distributor of BMW automobiles in Nigeria. Maduka’s success story is that of a man who started from the very bottom, went through several hurdles, and still turned up extraordinarily successful. His story teaches that resilience, hard-work, and taking advantage of opportunities at the right time is key to success for any entrepreneur anywhere in the world. Maduka has transformed from a zero to a HERO! It is therefore pertinent at every juncture of our lives, that we must acknowledge this obvious fact: that we need a backbone, and not a wish bone to keep supporting our courage faculty and maximizing our potentials for the fulfilment of our destiny(s) and achievement of our dream(s) and whatever aspirations we may have within us as humans to bless mankind with.
I tell you, friend, you too can rise from your present level to an exceedingly glorious and influential one. This is the will of God for you.
Exemplars of Greatness Series continues next week…
Watch out for the Book titled: “The Power of an Empowered Zero” (From Zero to HERO) by Tolulope A. Adegoke. Foreword by Dr Yomi Garnett (CEO/Chancellor, Royal Biographical Institute, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania U.S.A., U.K., Abuja, Nigeria.) Edited by Ola Aboderin.
By Henry Ukazu
Dear Destiny Friend,
Failure is one the dreaded, if not the most dreaded fears of the average human being. It competes favourably with poverty. Just like wealth and success boost the confidence of a person, so does failure humbles a man’s psyche. However, the ability to manage success as a skill, needs to be understudied to avoid failure.
In recent times, I have learnt to ask resourceful people more about their failures more than their success. As a matter of fact, people who have failed more have more to share than people who have succeeded. The irony of life is that most of the time, people tend to give more credence to those who have succeeded more than those who have failed.
Uninformed people see those who have failed as people with dirt or dent on their lives. In some cases, they are seen as nothing to write home about just because they failed. It’s instructive to note that failure is not alien to anyone. Everyone, at one time or another, experiences failure. What some people fail to understand however, is that the people who failed have a lot more to share than those who succeeded.
Just to put it in perspective, imagine a divorcee giving you a genuine advice on marriage; imagine a politician who has failed in several elections and later succeed giving you an advice on electioneering campaigns; imagine a businessman who failed in business up advising you on how to run a business; imagine a student who has failed a class advising you how to do well in a class. The list is literally endless. One thing is certain, all these failures will come from the place of love, pain and fulfilment and will be properly metaphor into gain if properly utilized.
I have failed many times more than I have succeeded and this failure has humbled me. If only our failures and mistakes are written on our face, no human will have a clean face. It’s so sad many people have allowed their mistakes and failures to define them.
To understand how to deal with failure, let’s explain the concept of failure with the word FAILURE.
Fall
Literally, when you fall, it means you have failed or fallen from an exalted position. Before one fails in life, one would have fallen. In contemporary times, uninformed people in our society tend to laugh at people who have failed elections, failed exams, failed in academics, failed in leadership positions, failed in marriage and failed in their personal and professional vocations. When you fail in life, the next thing is to acknowledge it and try to maximize the opportunity to bounce back.
Acknowledgement.
It’s only a fool who will do the same thing over and over again and expect to get a different result. When you make a mistake, the best thing to do as a leader is to acknowledge it and learn to avoid the mistake again. Failing to acknowledge your mistake will make people perceive you as having pride especially when one tries to apportion the blame to another person. When you acknowledge your mistake, the next stage is to investigate the mistake to avoid repeating it again.
Investigate.
This is the beginning of learning. When people investigate, they are trying to know more to verify certain information or acts. Without investigation, there will be little or no consequences. When it comes to failures, investigating a mistake doesn’t mean one is trying to find a fault, rather one is trying to know how to avert a similar problem. When one has truly found the answers to a problem, one will begin to learn from the experience what truly happened.
Learn
Nothing elevates one than learning from one’s mistakes. When you learn from your mistakes, you will be poised to unleash your potential by turning your mistakes into your friend. It’s quite unfortunate that many people don’t take time to learn. Learning will strategically position one to avoid mistakes. It’s said, a wise man learns from his mistakes, but a wiser man learns from other people’s mistakes. When one learns, one will understand how systems and structures work. When you learn more, you stand a better position to earn more especially when one has learned from their mistakes.
Understand
Failure in life comes with understanding. When one fails, one will see and understand life differently. Just to put this in perspective. Imagine a man who has fortune and has been a tremendous blessing to people and now lives in penury. Many of his beneficiaries will gradually slide to the next benefactor. Again, imagine a politician with influence as a Governor, Minister of President controlling and managing people and resources, one can’t imagine the beehive of people that will be trooping to his house and office daily seeking for favor. The day the man loses his position, he will understand the meaning of loyalty because the majority of people who were around him were simply there due to vested interests. If you call them sycophants, you won’t be totally wrong. This is simply the reality of life. Moral: Failure in life will give you understanding and wisdom.
When you experience this understanding, the best thing that can happen to you will be to realign with the right people with the right energy. Going back to the people who abandoned you literally means; one hasn’t learnt much and is about to make another terrible mistake.
Realign
Realignment comes with attraction. Just like kind attracts people with similar vision, purpose and energy attracts. Failure in life will make one practice alignment by taking stock of what’s working in and what’s not working. When one experiences failure, going to the same people, and situations that led one to the same mistake simply means the person hasn’t aligned well. When proper alignment has taken place, the next big stage is to evolve. This is where all the pieces will be put together to make failure have a meaning.
Evolve
When one evolves, it means one has metamorphosed into a new being. To evolve means one has grown and no longer operates from the place of lack. During my formative years in the USA, I used to be a horrible writer, but when you juxtapose the Henry Ukazu of 2010 and the Henry Ukazu of 2024, you will know the difference is clear. When you evolve, you will see a lot of transformation in your life.
Failure makes one evolve into a new beginning. To understand how one evolves, a newborn baby crawls before walking and running. In a similar vein, a child attends kindergarten school before attending elementary, middle school, high school, and college. All these are processes of evolution. Failure makes one evolve and transform into a better person. Failure has many parts and components and when they have been assembled, they will make one to evolve to a more refined and reformed being.
In summary, as you journey through life, see failure as an experience as opposed to a mistake. In that way, you will learn from it.
Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He’s the founder of Gloemi. He’s a Transformative Human Capacity and Mindset coach. He is also a public speaker, youth advocate, creative writer and author of Design Your Destiny and Unleash Your Destiny . He can be reached via info@gloemi.com
By Henry Ukazu
Greetings Destiny Friends,
It is generally believed that the two most important dates in a person’s life are the day of his birth and the day of his purpose-discovery. Every human being is born with a purpose and a gift. One of the best things that can happen to anyone is to know his purpose, and work assiduously to fulfill it. It is important to note that the day one discovers his purpose is the day he becomes a millionaire.
The journey of purpose can be demanding and tasking, but if one is dedicated to fulfilling the purpose, he must be ready to face and overcome the associated challenges.
When one is blessed with a bright future, distractions are bound to come up so that the purpose will not be fulfilled. This is because when you succeed in your purpose, many people will benefit, and when you fail many people who are supposed to benefit, will suffer loss. That’s why it’s always good for someone to achieve success, no matter how little.
One of the best ways to succeed in life is by working with one’s gift or talent. One will easily attract opportunities, favour, blessings, and tractions when gift is involved in the endeavour. Even enemies will be forced to seek your services when you are the best person to do the job.
It’s worthy of note that when one is working on purpose, he will easily be misunderstood, and that’s okay, but when one succeeds, the ovation will change. The transformation and blessings that come with purpose is priceless. This is because one will be revered and highly sought after.
A man of purpose is focused like an eagle. He sees life’s bigger picture. And in spite of failure in business, academics, relationship/marriage, personal and professional challenges, a person of purpose will still strive because he knows his desire for success outweighs his fear of failure.
It is easy for one to give up in life when one experiences setbacks after investing time and resources into a project. Imagine spending years to invest enormous amounts of money and time on a project and it still fails. That can be disastrous. There are many things that can make one lose focus in life. Also, imagine investing months and years studying for a degree only for one to fail because of one or two marks; it could be traumatic. Imagine investing ten, twenty and thirty years in a marriage and it fails, it could be heartbreaking. Imagine spending a lot to build a mansion only for it to be destroyed in minutes due to faulty foundation or act of nature. The story is endless.
To be a person of purpose, one must be determined to overcome the vicissitudes of life. Imagine knowing your purpose and gift, but lack the capacity, structure, and resources to diligently pursue it. It will take an extraordinary man with an extraordinary mindset to stay focused especially when faced with financial challenges.
Couple of years ago, a friend reached out to me for a job opportunity which pays almost three times of my salary. I was tempted to take the offer, but I had two concerns, first, I was being considered for a job by the Mayor of New York. Secondly, the job I was being touted for is a totally different industry. After giving it a serious consideration, I had to decline the job offer. Even though it appeared unpopular to a lot of people, I considered it a good decision because life is not about money but making an impact in the lives of people. Yes, the money is good, but I thought it would be great to stay focused on one’s purpose because at the end, it will ultimately attract opportunities which money can’t buy.
To be a man of purpose, there are two great and indispensable traits a man must possess, they are vision and focus. While the vision will keep the dream alive, focus will be the vehicle to actualize it. Every human being should pray for the grace to know their purpose and understand the associated vision that comes with that calling and then abide in that calling by being focused.
There are many men of purpose who have overcome the challenges of life to achieve great feats. One of the most revered men of history is the former late President of South Africa, President Nelson Mandela, who opposed South Africa’s apartheid system. He faced harsh conditions to deter his resolve to give all South Africans equality. He spent twenty-seven years in prison. Upon his release, he contested for the presidency and won. Now, that’s a man of purpose.
Another interesting story is Abraham Lincoln who lost his job in 1832; got defeated for State legislature in 1832. Failed in business in 1833. Failed in business. Elected to State legislature in 1834. His sweetheart died in 1835. He had a nervous breakdown in 1836. He was defeated for speaker in 1838. He was defeated for nomination for Congress in 1843. He was elected to Congress in 1846. Lost renomination in 1848. He was rejected for land officer in 1849. He was defeated for U.S Senate in 1854. He was defeated for nomination for Vice President in 1856. He was defeated for U.S Senate in 1858 and got elected as the 16th President of the United States of America.
What’s the moral here? It’s not easy to face all these challenges and still remain focused on the big picture. President Lincoln can be described as a man of purpose. If we are honest to ourselves, very few people can survive these setbacks.
In conclusion, I don’t know what your storyline is, but one thing I can guarantee you is that good things don’t come easily. One will be groomed like gold goes through fire to become gold. Also, oil will have to be refined before it can be transformed into a fine finished product. As you journey through life, resolve to be internally focused and mentally determined to be a person of purpose.
Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He’s the founder of Gloemi. He’s a Transformative Human Capacity and Mindset coach. He is also a public speaker, youth advocate, creative writer and author of Design Your Destiny Design Your and Unleash Your Destiny . He can be reached via info@gloemi.com
Dear Destiny Friends,
The best helping hand you will ever find is at the end of your own arm – John Mason
One of the best forms of love, if not the best, is self-love. The ultimate truth is that apart from the creator, nobody can love you more than you can love yourself.
As human beings, sometimes, we depend on other people’s love to feel loved. Some people even desire social media and online love just to be accepted into the society. No doubt, everyone loves attention and approval.
Everyone loves to be accepted, appreciated, and recognized, but some of us are not ready to do the needful to attract the desired attention. The simple truth about life is that nobody can give you attention, neither will anyone give you recognition if you have not given them a reason to do so. So, one needs to help themselves before other people can help them.
Helping yourself is the best thing that can happen to you. When you help yourself, the joy hits differently. Helping yourself is not limited to adding value to your life. Did you know that self-care is a lifestyle, and it is one of the ways to help your life. Some of the ways self-care can help your life are engaging in regular exercise, eating healthy, avoiding drugs and alcohol, and sleeping well. Self-help also involves taking care of your mental, emotional, physical, environment, recreational, financial, social, physical, and spiritual needs.
Did you know that practicing simple self-care activities can help one achieve greater mental clarity, and gain a better understanding of their feelings?
Helping oneself is okay so long as it doesn’t involve unlawful actions or breach of peace. It’s sad to see people engage in illegality just to get what they want.
Those that depend on fellow human beings for help might be disappointed. Even though they may not have the intention to fail you, life sometimes, happens. They too might be going through personal challenges. Always leave a space in your heart to forgive or overlook when supposed friends, mentors, family members, mentors and benefactors don’t come through for you.
The sad reality of life is that, most times, we like to receive from resourceful persons, but we don’t seem to ask who will give to them. Do you think manna will fall from heaven for them? No. They must find creative ways to make ends meet. One of my mentors once stated, ‘you can work alone, but you can’t eat alone’.
What you don’t know is that these resourceful people were able to help themselves. That’s why they were able to get assistance from established institutions and resourceful people. Some of them might have had a business plans which they pitched to a team of panelists. Some developed programmes, sowed seeds, traveled far and wide and made mistakes while searching for the right path. These are some ways of helping oneself.
I have always stated, we all go through a secret frustration which nobody knows. For a fact, it is easier for people to assist you when you have added adequate value to your life. When you do, people won’t see you as a liability, rather, they will see you as a resource being.
In my journey towards life, I have realized that when you have a mentor or leader you respect, your ability to do the work will enable them to put the icing on the cake. I vividly remember when I published my first book, I had to reach out to Dr. Chief Dele Momodu to write the Foreword to my book. He was kind enough to accept my request. Imagine, if I had not written the book, the opportunity wouldn’t have arisen.
Now, you see that I was able to help myself before help came through. Isn’t it true that heaven helps those who help themselves.
In contemporary times, sometimes, we hope and rely on family members, friends, mentors, associates, mentees, benefactors and more, to help our craft just because we feel and think they are in a better position to assist us, depending on their position or status, but the reality is that sometimes we ask people things that are beyond them and when they refuse to assist, we feel offended.
One of my mentors, Dr. Yomi Garnett, rightly stated as follows, “So your aunt won’t help you financially. Your well-connected uncle won’t give you an introductory note to his minister-friend. Refuse to despise or resent them. Forgive them. Make excuses for them, such as they have enough challenges of their own. Then promptly take responsibility for your own life and your own success by asking God to show you His way.”
I can relate to Dr. Garnett’s statement because, in the past, I have tried to reach some people, some I shared my programmes for consideration, while others came via introduction. In most of these engagements, I couldn’t get what I wanted either because I didn’t come prepared, or was yet to develop the required capacity and competence to execute the task. However, when I developed expertise, they came for me, and in some cases, I was highly recommended. This is the reality of life; people generally love ripe fruits as opposed to unripe fruits which don’t taste nice.
During my formative years, I depended on people to the extent I feel entitled for their support because I felt they were rich, wealthy, and highly connected. I didn’t realize life doesn’t work that way. It was much later in life I realized that it will be easier for them to share their network and net worth with me when I have helped myself. As a matter of fact, that has become my fate because I have had opportunities to relate and work closely with some of my benefactors.
Today, I charge you to make an intentional effort to help yourself. Give your life a meaning. Stop complaining and start to take action to change the course of your life. You are not alone in this struggle; we are all in it together. Remember, nobody can write your story more than you and if you don’t talk about yourself, nobody will talk about you.
In conclusion, endeavor to help yourself so others can help you.
Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He’s the founder of Gloemi. He’s a Transformative Human Capacity and Mindset coach. He is also a public speaker, youth advocate, creative writer and author of Design Your Destiny Design Your and Unleash Your Destiny . He can be reached via info@gloemi.com
