Mrs. Seinye O.B. Lulu-Briggs is the Chief Executive Officer of Rachael Hotels. She is a seasoned administrator and business-woman. She obtained a Diploma in Data Processing from East London University (formerly East Ham College of Technology) in 1981.
She started her working career with the Central Bank of Nigeria, Lagos in 1982, and rose to the position of Head of Computer Operations before moving to Oceanic Bank Plc in 1991 as Head of Administration, a position she held till 1993.
She was made an Executive Director at LA SIEN Center Limited in 1995. She is currently the Executive Vice Chairman of Moni Pulu Limited and a Non-Executive Director of Intercontinental Bank Plc.
She has attended various local and international training courses, including courses in Structural design methodologies (California, USA), Quality Assurance Testing Techniques (California USA) . In this interview, she talks about the 10-year anniversary of the Foundation she founded for the elderly.
What influenced the choice of the Foundation’s area of focus?
Over ten years ago, a close friend of mine and I were on the way to attend a function in the village. On the way there, we stopped by to visit the elderly aunt of a close friend of mine.
She was once a very beautiful lady, but poverty and the pain of the reduced circumstances in which she was now living, had changed her countenance greatly. Apart from being almost penniless, the roof of room in which this lady lived had a leak and rain was dripping onto her body and belongings.
This experience lingered on my mind and made me realize that we cannot ignore the fact of aging and the attrition that growing old can bring. It was in a bid to alleviate the pains of the elderly, especially in the rural areas where poverty is rampant, that we started the Care For Life programme. This you may say is our foundational and flagship programme.
The Foundation started its operations in 2001, with one area of focus which is care for the elderly. Ten years later, we work in 5 distinct programme areas: Care For Life; Education and Scholarship; Medical Missions; Micro credit and Entrepreneurship and the Safe Water Project.
Our choice of programme areas is directly influenced by our Vision, which is to ‘bring joy, purpose and meaning to the lives of the elderly and deprived among us.’
Don’t you think the result would have been greater if you had to concentrate on smaller challenges?
In a situation where the need and neglect is so great and so deep seated, there is no small challenges; all challenges we face are great ones. In a situation where you provide free medical treatment and discover that the root cause of some of the ailments being treated is the lack of potable water, what do you do? You have to tackle the safe water issue as well.
We are very aware of the need to make interventions in a manner that will not only be sustainable and scalable, but also where the impact is likely to be significant. And this is what we have done through each of our programme areas.
What has been the greatest challenge of running the Foundation?
The challenges are varied, depending on the programme area. The acute poverty and deprivation of people in the rural areas of the Niger Delta, obviously is a major general challenge. The dearth of modern infrastructure also poses a challenge. We have experienced great difficulties in some of the rural areas in which we have carried out our Free Medical Missions.
In some cases, we have refurbished and equipped entire hospitals and health centres. There is also the reality that many young professionals are loath to work in rural areas, so getting qualified medical personnel to attend to patients during the medical missions is also a challenge. Usually, we have to move into the outreach location with a team of out-of-town volunteer doctors, pharmacists etc. We have also had to purchase mobile operating units-so you can imagine the expense involved with that.
Above all, I would say that God Almighty has blessed us mightily and as He has laid this vision in my husband’s heart and mine, He has also provided the resources with which to actualize the vision. So I highlight these challenges just so you can have an inkling of what has to be overcome. More importantly, it is to enable me glorify God, from whom all of my blessings and help flow.
One of the major drawbacks of Foundations is the challenge of continuity; what steps have you taken to institutionalize the Foundation?
After 10 years, yes, we have certainly considered the issue of continuity and taken appropriate steps to address it. The O.B. Lulu-Briggs Foundation was started by my beloved husband, High Chief (Dr.) O.B. Lulu-Briggs, OON, DCF. It is a privately funded, registered charitable organization, with a properly constituted Board of Trustees.
The Foundation is run by an Executive Director, and there is a Director of Programmes and programme staff who handle each of the programme fields.
We regularly conduct vision sharing and mission evaluation exercises with our Board and staff, in order to properly share the Vision and ensure all stakeholders are on the same page regarding our vision, values and objectives.
Did you imagine the Foundation would live into its tenth anniversary?
Great oaks do grow from small acorns. We may not have planned that the Foundation would grow to be so big but we certainly planned to be here for the long haul.You see, our objectives are to assist the elderly, heal communities, improve lives and create opportunities for the indigent and needy. There is no foreseeable point when we can safely say all these objectives have been satisfactorily met; so now we’re here, we look forward to the next 10 years-with God being our helper.
What would you consider your greatest achievements thus far?
Being of service to our fellow man-what greater achievement could there be? We are called by our Lord, Jesus Christ to love our neighbour as ourselves. Every time we help one more household get ready access to clean water, we are loving our neighbour. Every time we provide free consultation, diagnosis and treatment to one sick person, we’re fulfilling the commandment to love that Jesus Christ gave us.
These are the achievements we choose to count for the Foundation.
Has there been any contact with some beneficiaries of your scheme to ascertain how the assistance has impacted their lives?
Let me explain, we are a very hands-on organization. Apart from the Free Medical Missions during which an average of 3000 people are treated, we keep track of the beneficiaries we have in each of the Local Government Areas in which we operate.
The Foundation employs trained caregivers to visit our beneficiaries regularly, and so we get regular feedback about how our programmes affect their lives.
Let me share one story with you. There was a lady in Abonnema, a village in Akuku-Toru Local Government Area of Rivers State. She used to look very frail and old and would frequently bemoan her life very publicly, calling for death to take her way from her travails. Well, after the Foundation took her on as a beneficiary and started visiting her readily, providing a monthly stipend, food stuff and sending evangelists and doctors to minister to her, each in their different ways, the lady changed her tune and today, she’s one of the most joyful senior citizens around. That’s another testimony to point to.
As at today, we have about 200 senior citizens like her from different communities that we have ‘adopted’ and who will remain our responsibility till they pass on. That’s our commitment.
There are too many similar stories for me to mention; so suffice it for me to say, we are a direct intervention organization, we stay close to our beneficiaries and we have a structured way of getting feedback about the impact of our programmes on the lives of the beneficiaries.
What are your dreams for the foundation in the next 10 years?
Our unspoken but unanimously adopted motto after this first decade of intervention is to go ‘Onwards and Upwards.’ In all we do-whether it is medical mission or educational support or safe water or entrepreneurship development, we want to scale things up-make things bigger and better in order to cater to more people.
We would like to attract more partners for our work-actually this is something we are aggressively working on at the moment. It is our goal to have wide pools of volunteer medical personnel to work with; especially those in specialized areas like maxillo facial surgery and opthalmogy. We also intend to partner with pharmaceutical companies in order to get highly subsidized pharmaceutical supplies for our Free Medical Missions.
We want to model best practices and show that things can be done well for the poor and needy and by so doing, encourage more people in Rivers State, other parts of the Niger Delta and all over Nigeria, to take our simple ideas, apply them in their communities and grow the oasis of love and care.
Do you keep track of how much you have committed so far to actualize the Foundation goals?
Yes we do have a systematic way of capturing and tracking our financial commitments. More importantly, we capture and track our spiritual commitments to ensure that our heart is always in the right place and that we carry out our actions from the point of view of love.
Source: Vanguard
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