His thirst for troubled or dead companies is unquenchable. From the time he made a burrow into business some years ago, Jimoh Ibrahim has acquired a number of sick companies from different parts of the country. Among these are NICON Hotel in Victoria Garden City, VGC, Lagos, EAS Airlines, which was rebranded NICON Airlines, Abuja Le Meridien, renamed NICON Luxury Hotels, NICON Insurance, Nigerian Reinsurance, Government Guest House and more than 200 filling stations spread across the country, among many others. Ibrahim, who prides himself as a turnaround expert, says he has succeeded in taking these companies out of the woods and repositioned them for profitability. But his recent acquisition of the financially troubled Virgin Nigeria, which was renamed Nigerian Eagle, has got tongues wagging. If he could not revive NICON Airlines, what magic wand would he apply to revitalise Virgin Nigeria? But Ibrahim says there`s no basis for comparing both acquisitions, assuring that the turnaround of the troubled airline will last between six months and one year, since it is technically sound. The 43-year-old controversial businessman, whose business empire spans oil and gas, hospitality, real estate, insurance, media, industries, financial services and many other sectors, may have decided to try his luck with new ventures, which perhaps explains why he had to obtain a licence from the Central Bank of Ghana to establish a bank in the West African country. He is also planning to go into commercial farming. But this is not a departure from his business model, which revolves around purchasing dead or dying companies, as he assured TELL magazine team of Ademola Ogunlowo, editor Broad

Street Journal, Helen Eni, senior assistant editor, and Segun Olakitan, photo editor, in an exclusive interview that “this is not the last company that I would acquire.� Excerpts. What informed your decision to acquire Virgin Nigeria? What we know how to do is to buy troubled companies and turn them around. We commenced this transaction since 2009 but we didn`t want to go to the press while the negotiation was still on. The reason why we acquired it is to turn it around and make it viable for Nigerians, which is what we know how to do, which is turning around relatively bad companies. Given the antecedent of you acquiring EAS Airline, which you transformed to NICON Airways, what is going to be the new situation? The EAS issue is quite interesting. We stopped that from flying while the Virgin deal was on the table and they are two different companies. This has a very great potential of connectivity across the nation and its attempt to commence international flights. The problems are also different. Virgin Nigeria is technically sound. In fact, in terms of technicality and safety, I would say Virgin scores a distinction, an A grade. Their problem is financial distress which began to affect operational distress or may result to operational distress and you have to quickly arrest that so that it doesn`t go into technical distress. That is where intervention becomes very necessary. So what we have is taking a company, looking at the diagnosis and from our diagnosis, it indicates that we have a very sound technical company where safety is guaranteed, but as it begins to have a turn of financial distress, this might lead to operational distress that would eventually

cripple technical distress. We came in to arrest that and I think in a matter of days, things are beginning to look up. If your purpose of acquiring Virgin Nigeria is to turn it around, why couldn`t you turn around EAS Airline after acquisition? I am not the only shareholder in EAS. In Virgin Nigeria, I have controlling shares so I can do whatever I want to do. I control board and management. I don`t control board and management in the other airline, so don`t let us go into that. Again, we flew EAS for about 16 months and it did not crash. It did not have any landing problem. So when we were arguing over whether to lease aircraft or buy aircraft and some of our shareholders believe we should buy. I believe we should lease. I don`t like dominating issues so I allowed those who opted for outright purchase of aircraft to have their way. So that is the way it was. Virgin Nigeria deal is different because here I dominate virtually all decisions because I have enough shares to take vital decisions at both board and management levels. You cannot control both board and management and then say you do not have enough leverage to do what you want to do to the turn around the company. So let us concentrate on Virgin Nigeria than EAS, after all, you have many airlines that are now dead – Okada, ADC and others. Are you ruling out merger with NICON Airways? We can merge. In 2008, when I had an option between continuing to invest in EAS, I had got Virgin Nigeria on the table and as a turn-around expert, what I needed to do was to allow a decision. Do I want to put money in EAS or I want to pick Virgin Nigeria that has only financial distress problem. When an airline has one problem,

it is easier to manage than the one with multiple problems. EAS had so many problems – financial, operational, technical. But Virgin Nigeria has only one problem – financial distress. If you lock down financial distress, then it will not lead to operational distress and it will not lead to technical distress. So the period of your turn-around should be shorter than expected. What is your share ownership in Virgin Nigeria? I will not mention it. But I have enough; I have controlling shares to do whatever I need to do. Who are the other shareholders? I don`t know yet. Maybe all these will come to light later. But I haven`t seen much of shareholder presence now. What is your blueprint to revitalise Virgin Nigeria? Having identified the problem, which is very key, you need to do the diagnosis, which we have done successfully. We look at the case of the patient, it doesn`t require any operation. So what we found is financial distress that is about to affect operational distress and we don`t want it to go into technical distress. So what we decided to do is, number one, go in there quickly, address staff, cut down cost, inject money, then go into leasing of aircraft rather than buying aircraft and increase your operations, and then get more funding to fund your turn-around. The way to start turnaround, from my own experience, is to start with creditors` meetings, change airline`s name because brand is an issue. Give it a new befitting name and then move on from there gradually. Stabilise staff, which we have done already and are still doing. Get your funding completely restructured via a new capital injection. So where you have two years loan maturing in 24 mont

24 months, now you have 14 years loan, so they are quite different ball game. Once that is done, bring in some reasonable aircraft to start the routes. Our concentration would be local and regional routes before we go into international routes. It is the success of the local and regional routes that will define the international routes. What we do at the board level is to ask management to concentrate on a separated management focus and that means, have a GM (general manager) in charge of regional flights, a GM in charge of local flights and a GM in charge of international flights. Now every GM will account to the MD (managing director) about how his operation goes. We have decided in our turnaround timetable not to go into technical areas because it is sound. We have contracted that to Lufthansa Tecknic and Ethiopian Airlines and they have been doing fantastic jobs so we don`t have any issue with them. So they are happy to continue to maintain our aircraft. So our turnaround will not go into that area in the next five years. In turnaround, it is not every area that you can get involved; some of them you can contract them out to professional hands. What new name have you chosen for the airline? I will not tell you now. When the time comes, we will all gather at a place to unveil the plaque and announce the new name. You have a brand already – NICON. Are you going to use the name? It is not going to be NICON. In the turnaround process, you said you have done a diagnosis of the situation and found the problem to be mainly financial. In monetary terms how much are you looking at to reposition the airline? We are looking forward to having meetings with the creditors

and pay them as much as we can pay them and reschedule the debts. I can assure you that about 90 per cent of the debts would be cleared. Not less than $200 million would be cleaned off from the balance sheet of the company in a matter of weeks. That would mean the financial distress has been solved. So what we would now need is administrative balance and engineering. We can do that in three months then you have an airline at hand. Do you envisage any challenges? No, I don`t envisage any challenges except if there are self-inflicted challenges, we would be up to the task. What is the situation with NICON Insurance? NICON Insurance has been turned around completely and they are doing very well. They are honouring their obligations to their customers. The company has even expanded into Sao Tome and it is the only company insuring government assets by 100 per cent. There are only two insurance companies in Sao Tome and NICON is the biggest. It is doing very good investment turnover and targeting to pay pensioners all outstanding pensions in its books. The company is doing well. You have renewed your interest and concern in the aviation industry with the acquisition of Virgin Nigeria. What would you consider to be the major problems with the aviation industry in Nigeria and how should these problems be addressed? The major problem in the aviation industry is lack of cooperation among the operators not regulator. I can tell you that the regulators are very sound. NCAA (Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority) is one of the best in the world. The operators are the problem. A situation whereby you have a Virgin Nigeria ticket, you cannot fly Arik or vice versa is terrible. There

There should be cooperation among the operators and we are ready to provide the lead in Virgin. With time, I am going to talk to Arik on the issue of cooperation. Cooperation is one major thing we need to achieve in the industry because the moment NCAA certifies an aircraft, then it is airworthy. So there is no reason why we cannot have ticket exchange and have a central control room whereby we do clearing like it is done in the banking sector. Why can`t aviation sector do the same and have some areas of cooperation so that when government puts funds in the system it will have a good multiplier effect. This kind of cooperation will solve the problem of flying aircraft with empty seats. The system will bring about operational efficiency. For instance, if I want to go to Abuja by 8 a.m. in Virgin and Arik is also going to Abuja. Why can`t I fly Arik. Why can`t a passenger carrying Virgin ticket fly Aero Contractor? These are issues we need to resolve in the aviation industry. So when we have attained some level of stability, we will start talking to other operators to see how we can achieve this. But don`t you think finance is also a major problem? No matter the amount of money you invest in the aviation sector, if you don`t solve this problem of lack of cooperation, it won`t yield good result. Airlines will be able to manage their finances. As I speak, I have two airlines offered to me for sale after I have bought Virgin Nigeria. I won`t mention their names. That means there is financial distress in the industry. But if we have this kind of cooperation, it will help to boost the services of the airlines. The idea of buying aircraft is not the important thing. All ove

All over the world, you lease aircraft. Delta Airlines has 27,000 pilots, about 4,000 aircraft. What is happening to NICON Luxury Suites? Haven`t you seen the turnaround that is being done there? We have about 15 conference rooms. We never had that before. We have about nine restaurants, we never had that before. All the room have been stabilised. The next thing now is to open contractor bid to complete the remaining rooms. How many rooms do you have? We have more than 400 rooms and we need to put in another 300 rooms. We are at the stage of opening contractor bid. The turnaround there is completed. The company is now stabilised. We are now looking at additional investment to bring in additional income. After this, the next stage we will go into is helping to set up other hotels – five-star hotels — in any part of the country. The Federal Government Guest House is still what it used to be when you bought it… The Federal Government Guest House is a personal purchase. It is not a company, it is just a guest house. I didn`t say I will run it as a guest house. I bought it for personal use. I could decide to make it my residence. I bought it for about N2.6 billion as at that time. If I choose to live in Victoria Island, that would be a perfect place for me. Even with the state of the property? The property is okay. About 36 of our staff are living there. It is still in good shape. People say you bought it just for speculation and that you would end up selling it after much price appreciation. I don`t expect that everybody will be clapping for me in Nigeria. The truth is we have never had any company that died in our hands. We bought NICON Insurance and

turned it around. We bought Nigeria Reinsurance and turned it around. We have NICON Luxury. We bought 210 petrol stations from people whose stations were already dead and they are all functioning. We bought the National Mirror and it will be on the newsstand any moment from now. That is the much we could do for our country and it is so amazing that we have now increased our workforce to about 18,900 staff for the group. This figure is huge considering the short period we had to do this. Many state governments do not have this number of workers and don`t forget that I don`t have federal government allocation to run business. I do my business by getting loans and I do return the loans to the banks. If I don`t have credibility, I don`t think the banks can give us facilities. Having mentioned bank facilities, the CBN portrayed you and some other prominent Nigerians as being bad debtors… I have reacted to all this before. CBN was misinformed and we published the details of what we have. I didn`t borrow from CBN so CBN has no locus to discuss about me. I am not regulated by CBN. As at the time they said we were owing Oceanic Bank N14 billion. Today we owe Oceanic Bank N2.5 billion and we are landlord of the bank in about 25 branches. CBN does not understand all these issues. We have about 890 million units of Oceanic Bank shares. Even if I sell them at N3.00, it will pay the N2.5 billion. So even if I am a bad debtor, what is bad in that? What is important is that I have a mission to accomplish and I must accomplish it within the period I want to accomplish it. Forget about all this cosmetic things. It is very easy to criticise, let them come and do it. Come and buy one o

of the dead companies and turn it around and employ 18,000 staff and begin to pay their salaries. Even Richard Branson is only good in aviation. I am in oil & gas, I am in hotel, I am in insurance, financial services, aviation, media. Do you think it is easy? Some people call you an undertaker because of your penchant for acquiring troubled companies. Is this a deliberate strategy or business style to acquire dead companies? I don`t know the meaning of undertaker. What I know is that it is a business model. When I came back from Harvard, I ran the first interview with TELL and I told them where we are going to. So when you see these things happening, you should know that we are following a model. They can call me anything. I have heard so many names. Some call it octopus, some say it is turnaround, some say it is phenomenal. Call what I do anything, the name does not matter to me. What is important to me is that the company we acquire must be turned around. My goal is to employ about 30,000 Nigerians. When you did an edition on me about five years ago and you said `The Midas Touch`, has it not happened now? We promised that we would provide about 3,000 employment. But just five years after from zero employment then, we are now close to 20,000, isn`t that amazing? This is not the last company that we would acquire. I am sure you are aware that I have been given a licence to operate a commercial bank in Ghana. The bank will start operation by July. Do you think it will be easy for the Ghana Central Bank to give a licence to someone if he does not have integrity? If they can give me a licence to own a bank 100 per cent, it is amazing. I got the Financial Services licence, C

Class A in Sao Tome to open an insurance company and we are there. We have opened two offices in London. We have Nigerian Re- and NICON Insurance offices there and we are working on some other things to license the insurance company in London. We are moving on. I told you five years ago that our brand will provide employment for thousands of Nigerians. It will create integrity for Nigeria and also affect the global community. Is it not happening now? You joined the PDP recently and people say you bought the National Mirror to launch your political career. Forget about what people say. If I have a newspaper, should I use it against myself? What do you want to achieve by joining the PDP? I am looking at the party to win election at all levels. If you are in a party what are you looking at? You are looking at it to win election. The paper is going to start operation very shortly. We have six machines, each one of them installed in each of the six geo-political zones and they will all be publishing simultaneously. Where the need arises, it will give support to all political parties. Do you intend to contest for any elective office? I don`t know now, we need to build the party first. Anybody who is in politics is always interested in elective position because a politician is a politician. You used to have sympathy for ANPP. That was because my political leader, Muhammadu Buhari was there. I waited this long because of him. I would have joined PDP long time ago, but I thought it would be a betrayal to Buhari if I left because he likes me a lot. So when Buhari announced his exit from ANPP, I waited for about six months before announcing my exit. Which other are

area of the economy do you have plans to go into? There is none. We are in industry, we manufacture furniture for different major multinational companies in Nigeria. We bought the hotel in VGC (Victoria Garden City). That was the first acquisition. We turned it around and now it has huge patronage. We are in hotels, aviation, insurance, banking, oil & gas with our Global Fleet. We are in media. I don`t think there is any major area of the economy where we are not present. Except perhaps agriculture. We will soon set up NICON farms. We will establish one in Benue State and the other one in Igbotako (Ondo State). We are going to have large farms where crops would be produced. We will employ agric graduates and buy them modern equipment to run the farms. After this, I will stay one or two years to work on the structure of the company and from there I can hand it over to my colleagues to run them. We have eight hotels and I am not the one working there to provide the services. Our bank that will start operation in Ghana in July, I will not be the one dealing with the customers there. Our airlines will be flying to Ghana as we speak and I am not the pilot. We strive to allow our management to handle our operations. In 2008, you said you planned to retire at the age of 45. Now with all these plans still coming on board, do you think you can accomplish this? Oh yes, it very easy. The turnaround of Virgin will only take six months to one year and then I`ll hands off. I will only attend board meetings. So I am not in many of my companies because they are now getting stabilised in terms of management running. I only have to be at board meetings. In two years time I have t

to resign my appointment at boards. In fact from next year, you`ll probably see me disengaging from some of the boards. It is enough for me to go and take my dividend at end year.