PROFILE: Meet New Sugar Council Boss, Kamar Bakrin

By Nafisat Bello

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu earlier on Friday announced the appointment of Mr Kamar Oladipo Bakrin as the new Executive Secretary of the National Sugar Development Council (NSDC).

Mr Bakrin, is replacing Mr Zacch Adelabu Adedeji who was recently appointed as the Acting Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) after spending two years as NSDC boss.

Bakrin, a chartered accountant, is bringing on board over two decades of broad-based experience at executive levels in different reputable organisations.

Bakrin, 56, is an experienced business advisor and entrepreneur. He has over 25 years of experience in various industries including oil and gas, cement manufacturing, and infrastructure development. He is the founder and Managing Director of Vios Principals, a business advisory firm based in Lagos. He also serves on the board of several companies including Oando Plc, Honeywell Group Ltd., and Helios Investment and Partners.

He holds a BA in Agriculture Economics from the University of Ilorin and an MBA from the Columbia Business School in the United States. He is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN) and a member of the Institute of Directors, Nigeria (IoD). He is a Director at HTN Towers

Mr. Bakrin once served as Operating Partner at Helios Investment Partners. He also served as an Advisor at LoftyInc Capital Management.

Prior to joining Helios in December 2013, he spent two years as Group Executive of the Honeywell Group, one of Nigeria’s leading indigenous conglomerates, where he was focused on developing the group’s cement and oil and gas businesses. Before joining Honeywell, he founded and acted as CEO of Vios Principals, an advisory firm focused on investing in and transforming Africa-focused enterprises.

He previously gained six years’ experience at Ocean and Oil Holdings / Oando PLC, where he was recently CEO of Oando Energy Services with responsibilities spanning group strategy, investments and strengthening the group’s portfolio companies’ capabilities.

Before his appointment as CEO, he served as the COO of Oando Marketing and prior to that, as the Executive Vice President / Head of Corporate Development of Ocean & Oil Holdings. During this time, he led the post-merger integration of two publicly listed companies, Unipetrol and Agip and that feat represented the largest merger in Nigerian history.

Prior to this, he gained experience with the Boston Consulting Group, Colgate Palmolive, and Arthur Anderson (now KPMG).

In politics, Bakrin served as Special Adviser to the immediate-past Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Adeniyi Adebayo.