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Passion is Stronger Than Power by Henry Ukazu

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Greetings my beloved friends. Today, we shall be discussing one of the hidden secrets of most successful people if not all that ever lived on the planet earth. If you care to know, that secret is passion. Passion is an uncontrollable force fueling the bloodstream of a determined being.  Without passion, it will be difficult to be successful in any productive venture. Passion can be likened to spiritual strength because it can’t be seen but it can be felt internally while power can be likened to physical strength.

According to Oprah Winfrey  “Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.” For me, I’m able to discipline myself to write because I have joy and fulfillment in writing. If I don’t have passion in writing and researching, I won’t be consistent in writing every week. My passion is not only limited in writing, I also have passion in leadership, youth empowerment, public speaking and serving humanity in any little way I can.  That’s the more reason I agree with Mia Ham when she said: “If you don’t love what you do, you won’t do it with much conviction or passion.”

During the course of this article, we shall be looking at how passion can influence and empower us to be successful; how we can discover our passion. We shall also be studying the relativity between passion and love; passion and money; passion and talent. We shall end the discussion with some great quotes that can keep you focus as you follow your heart by pursuing your passion. Since this article is about passion and power, it is pertinent to note that successful people know that passion is energy. It is what drives people to succeed. Without passion towards what you are doing, you do not have a WHY and when you do not have a WHY then HOW  is hard to find.

One of the most difficult thing in the world is knowing oneself. A lot of people struggle with this feeling and this has really affected their success both their personal and professional development. It’s an indisputable fact that identification of a problem is fifty percent solved and the journey of a thousand miles begins with a step in the right direction.  Discovering your passion is not really easy, but it can be easy if you know yourself.

It’s worthy to note that without passion it will be hard to succeed in any business or profession. Passion is more than ordinary strength, it is the energy that fuels the blood.  All the great people that have ever succeeded in life were passionate about their cause in addition to believing in themselves. It is because of this belief that made John Sculley the former CEO of Pepsi to leave his job to join Steve jobs who was still building his company. He believed in the works of Steve Jobs in addition to seeing how passionate Steve Jobs was in his product and today, the rest is history. If you have a passion, please don’t allow it to die.  According to Deepak Chopra “In all my research, the greatest leaders looked inward and were able to tell a good story with authenticity and passion.” Be informed, You are capable of changing the world with your dreams if you allow it to come through. According to the former president of South African Nelson Mandela “There is no passion to be found playing small–in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.

 

The big question is how can passion influence your success? If you are passionate about a cause, you will not only spend quality time on the task, you will go the extra mile trying to know more about the cause. You can even volunteer or pay to attend a workshop, seminar or an event of interest. There’s a saying, people see people that participate. When you spend valuable time trying to know more about a cause, people see you and when an opportunity comes up, your name normally comes first to mind.  It was because of the passion Americans saw in  Ocasio-Cortez  that made her constituents to elect her as the youngest female in Congress on November 6, 2018.  Successful people know that you can’t do everything at the same time.  Just focus your energy on one particular task and believe your turning point will come through. In our contemporary society, the world is being governed by perception. People see what you do without you knowing and that’s why it’s very important you scrutinize what you share on social media, and the people and causes you identify with.

The next big question is how do you discover your passion? As mentioned earlier, knowing yourself is one of the most difficult tasks in life. A good way to know to know your passion is to ask yourself “If I have everything in the world, what will I do with my time”? Another way of knowing your passion is by discovering those things you like to do with relative ease. Your passion is that cause or work that makes you happy. You can easily do it any time of the day. Once you are passionate about any cause, you look beyond the pain. Let’s look at the relativeness of passion with other relevant words of interest.

Passion and Love: Passion is a very strong feeling about a person or thing. Passion is an intense emotion, a compelling enthusiasm or desire for something. Love is all about what you feel to care about, that comes along with affection, desire, and pleasure. Passion is the energy that keeps us going, it gives us meaning, and happiness, and excitement, and anticipation. Passion is a powerful force in accomplishing anything you set your mind on.  Once you are passionate about something, you will love it.  According to Barbara Corcoran “You can’t fake passion.”

Another way of understanding passion is by looking at a lady in love. Any lady that truly loves a man will go all out to fight for the man. She will date and even marry him for true love as opposed to martial possession regardless of the pressure and circumstances facing her. There’s a saying that there are two people you can’t advise:  A rich man with money and a woman in love.  This is because a woman in love won’t understand any other language except the love language of the man in question which according to Gary Chapman can be words affirmation, physical touch, gift, time or services.

Passion and Money: One of the fastest ways of making money is by solving a problem.  If you don’t have money, it’s either because you are not solving problems for the right people or there’s a fundamental problem with your product. Once you provide the right services, opportunities will locate you. Many people have the mentality that following your passion might make you broke because it might take a long period of time to achieve success.  I strongly disagree with that school of thought. This group of people believes that one might be broke in the guise of being passionate about a cause. According to them, they would rather take whatever is available just to put food on the table.  I have a good news for them, handwork doesn’t kill, what kills is laziness. As an optimistic being, if you know yourself and know your product, all you need is consistency, perseverance, and patience. Trust me, It won’t be long for your breakthrough to come through. One of the great ways of knowing a passionate being is by looking at the time the individual spends on the product. A typical example is the lifestyle of an entrepreneur. They will grind and grind to the extent they might be mocked, they will get so many no’s and rejection, but the moment their product is accepted or endorsed the story changes. If you are in this category, my advise to you is hang in there. All you need is just one yes.  Steve Jobs was definitely right when he said “You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out”. Also according to Harriet Tubman “, Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.”

Passion And Talent: Passion is different from talent. If you are talented in doing something you really love, you may want to meditate and see if that’s where your passion lies. Talent is similar to gift with a slight difference. A creative mind can combine his or her talent, gift and skill to his/her passion to create a product or service. The idea is that the key to finding a great career is to identify your greatest interest – “your passion” – and pursue a career involving that interest. Moral: Just commit to following your passion, and you’ll have a great career. It is been said that when you do what you love, you will never work a day in your life. Isn’t it true that when you do what you love, you can make a real difference in people’s lives. With your passion, you can inspire others to find their dreams too. Passionate minds believe in paying now and playing later. They are never deterred in what they are facing. They strongly believe in what they have in their mind in addition to seeing the bigger picture. The Book of life States in 1 John 4:4 “ He that is in you is greater than he that is in the world.”

In conclusion, If you will agree with me, passion is the driving force behind success and happiness that allows us all to live better lives. It is because of passion that many people decide to go back to school to study a major that interest them; It is because of passion that a lot of people decide to have a Non-Government Organization to affect humanity and the list continues.  I end this article by leaving you with four great quotes to meditate namely:

“Nothing is as important as passion. No matter what you want to do with your life, be passionate.”-Jon Bon Jovi.

“If you feel like there’s something out there that you’re supposed to be doing, if you have a passion for it, then stop wishing and just do it.”-Wanda Skyes

As you spend time with passionate, successful people, success skills will start to manifest in your live too. Successful people understand that in order to achieve, they must love what they do. So find something that you love to do and you will be following your passion. Passion is the fastest way to massive success. British Statesman.

A person can succeed at almost anything they have unlimited enthusiasm- Charles M. Schwab.

Finally, what’s your passion and what are you passionate about? Will you agree with me that passion is greater than power?

Henry Ukazu writes from New York. He works with the New York City Department of Correction as the Legal Coordinator. He can be reached via henrous@gmail.com

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Glo 1 Cable is the King of Telecoms

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By Eric Elezuo

Available data and recent happenings have proved that it is not by coincidence that leading telecommunications company, Globacom, is the market leader, not only in provision of telecom services, but in being proactive to foresee future occurrences. This is exemplified in its ability to remain running even as acclaimed major networks have temporarily packed up as a result of the main one cable malfunction a few days ago in Nigeria, and some African countries.

Globacom’s Glo 1 submarine cable has literally remained the only hope for internet users covering both banking and browsing usages.

The GLO-1 (Globacom-1) submarine communications cable, which came on board in 2009, is a cable system along the west coast of Africa between Nigeria and the UK, owned by Nigerian telecoms operator Globacom, under the dynamic leadership of Africa’s pride, Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr.

The submarine cable system is 9,800 km long, and became operational in 2011 with a minimum capacity of 640 Gbit/s.

A project of Globacom, Nigeria’s 2nd largest telecoms provider, total capacity of the system is now advertised as 2.5 Tbit/s. The cable’s link to Ghana was turned up in April, 2011, meaning that Ghana subscribers are part of the millions still enjoying uninterrupted network experience, the failure of main one, notwithstanding.

It would be recalled that massive internet outages was reported in Nigeria following damage to international undersea cables supplying the country with connectivity.

But Glo was not affected, a testimonial that Nigeria should celebrate the brand as against other networks that buckled under the weight of the underwater cable failure, the humongous money they are making from Nigerians notwithstanding. Those also goes to show that they don’t believe in the country.

Reports show that telecommunications companies and a number of banks which rely on the affected cables for internet services were affected by the outage, and will continue to be partially or completely out of service for the next five weeks if reports emanating from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is anything to go by.

According to reports, the damage affected major undersea cables near Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire and has led to internet downtime across West and South African countries.

The undersea cables affected are the West Africa Cable System (WACS), the Africa Coast to Europe (ACE), MainOne, and SAT3.

However, Glo 1, owned by Nigeria’s leading digital services company, Globacom, was not affected by the damage and has continued to operate normally. Data users, internet service providers and financial institutions which run on Glo 1 have continued to operate normally.

Industry analysts believe the sturdy nature and resilience of Glo 1 International Submarine Cable is the reason the damage did not affect the cable.

It would be recalled that the Glo submarine cable system Glo 1, made a historic landing in Alfa Beach, Lagos, Nigeria, in 2009. The landing marked the beginning of cheap bandwidth which in itself translated into many possibilities in the Information and Communications sectors of the Nigerian economy.

The project jointly executed by Globacom and its partners, Alcatel Lucent gave and continues  to give Nigeria lead in telemedicine, eCommerce and egovernance among other practices that transform economies.

Then, the Executive Director, Human Resources, Mr Adewale Shangowawa, noted that with the landing of the Glo1 submarine cable, Globacom has scored another first and as well has taken a bold step to give Nigeria the lead in the magical broadband revolution in Africa.

The 9800km cable from Bude in UK, connects Nigeria to the rest of West Africa and the UK. It has landing points in Nigeria, London and Lisbon in Portugal. It is deploying 16 branching units to connect countries in West Africa.

The ED added that globally, the tradition is for a consortium of telecommunication companies to team up to set up a submarine cable network to enhance their connectivity and bandwidth capacity. Globacom became an exception to the norm.

Glo is the first single telecommunication company in the world to own its submarine cable. The high capacity Glo 1 optic fibre cable brought functional direct connectivity between West Africa, the UK and the rest of the world. The 9,800 km long cable provided huge capacity on its 2-fibre pair system. The Glo 1 cable also made available excess bandwidth to all the cities connected to the cable.

This will translate into much faster and more robust connectivity for voice, data and video. The cable will connect 14 West African countries through the branching units to the rest of the world. It will boost economic activities in the region, create job opportunities and serve companies in Europe and Africa.

Facts of the submarine cable landing included that Glo 1 provides connectivity from Lagos to Bude in United Kingdom through fibre optic cable laid undersea.

The cable which is of the 32 STM 64 type has virtual infinite capacity and therefore offers sufficient capacity for traffic for the Globacom’s mobile, fixed, and internet telecommunication services.

Last September, the $250 million Glo-1 cable system landed initially in Lagos and in Accra in Ghana. With 2.5 Tbps of capacity, the Glo-1 cable has been ready for commissioning since July 2010.

Mike Adenuga Jr., Globacom’s chairman, while describing the $250 million project, said the Glo-1 cable will provide Nigerian user’s two benefits: become part of the competitive telecom landscape and make broadband access and long-distance voice service more affordable.

As a company with unparalleled vision, and proactive initiatives, Glo in 2018, and in a bid to boost its data services and remain preferred data services provider with clarity and reach, commenced upgrading its undersea cable, Glo 1 capacity by 100G.

Bisi Koleoso, a deputy chief operating officer, Technical, then, which explaining the process said that, in addition the company as well is investing in equipment for more path redundancy for the Glo 1 in case of fiber cut. In 2024, fibre cut occurred, and Glo is still up and running.

“As the innovation leader in Nigeria’s telecom space, Globacom is committed to ensuring that Nigerians were not left behind in the march to a digitalised world.

“We have invested massively in new technologies to introduce these products which we believe will redefine business, social and personal pursuits,” the DCO had said.

The visionary company did not stop there however. Consequently, on April 8, 2011, it followed up the launch of the sub-marine optical fibre cable, Glo I Submarine Cable, which gulped a whopping $800 million, thereby making it the first telecommunication company to build such a high-capacity optic fibre from the United Kingdom to Nigeria with the rolling out of the Glo 2 submarine cable. The submarine optic fibre cables was designed to connect Lagos directly to Southern parts of Nigeria.

The submarine cables was programmed to “contain three fiber pairs. Fiber Pair 1 (Express) will connect Lagos directly to Southern part of Nigeria with terrestrial extension to existing terrestrial backbone.

“Fiber Pair, also known as Omnibus 1, has eight branching units to offshore oil stations and communities. Fiber Pair 3, otherwise called Omnibus 2, contains two switchable branching units southward Africa.”

The Glo II Submarine Cable would boost overall socio-economic development of the Niger Delta, and offer greater bandwidth for local ICT business to flourish and provide backup for the terrestrial fibre route from Port Harcourt to Lagos.

The company further explained that Glo 2 will equally be much more reliable as far as fibre cut is concerned, assuring that Globacom “has put in place workable plans to scale up the network for the future and innovation in products.

A statement on the effect, read in part: “We plan to initiate new data analytic tools to capture subscribers’ experience in real time and also take pre-emptive actions to improve the network. Also new sites would be rolled out into rural areas, banishing digital divide between cities and villages….to increase capacity by giving a congestion-free network and superior quality in voice data. We also plan to swap old equipment in other states with better quality ones, so that our subscribers can have better services.”

Glo’s invincibility in the telecommunication world is nothing short of insightful leadership, clear cut vision and the passion to put customers first in all its undertakings. This is not forgetting that it has done everything to project Nigeria’s ingenuity in the field of telecommunication,  and by extention other fields.

Glo is flourishing under the leadership of the spirit of Africa, Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr., and the Executive Vice Chairman, Mrs Bella Adenuga-Disu.

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Glo Unveils Korrect Predict Lottery Service, Rewards Subscribers with Cash, Airtime

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A new product, Glo Korrect Predict Lottery has been unveiled by telecommunications services provider, Globacom. Under the new service, any sports lover on Glo network who successfully predicts the final outcomes of football matches played across the world will be rewarded with fantastic cash prizes and free airtime.

“Sports Prediction Market has witnessed significant growth over the years, with a projected value of over $155 billion globally by 2024 and that, the growth is driven by the proliferation of smartphones, increase in online betting platforms, as well as increased sports viewership and adoption of technology”, Globacom said in a statement In Lagos.

This trend, the company explained underscored the unveiling of the new service Korrect Predict lottery, which it said, will give subscribers the opportunity to win cash gifts from predicting match results accurately.

According to Globacom “Subscribers will receive 2 football matches daily for them to predict the correct scores after which those who accurately predict the outcomes of their preferred matches will win amazing prizes from Glo”.

To subscribe to Korrect Predict, you will either dial the USSD Command *7023# or send the keyword “KPRD” to the shortcode “7023” to subscribe to the daily plan costing just N50 or send the keyword “KPW” to the shortcode “7023” to subscribe to the weekly plan of N150. Upon successful subscription, you will receive an SMS with a link to access the service”.

For the first active subscription when they select any of the daily, or weekly auto-renewal plan, Glo said subscribers will enjoy free trial, adding that “This means that a new subscriber can activate the service at no cost for the first twenty-four hours, after which he or she will then be charged for the next renewal cycle. Subscribers who do not want to be charged after the free trial and buy offer will have to cancel their service renewal before the twenty-four hours elapse by dialing the USSD command for deactivation”.

Glo Korrect Predict provides access to two daily predictions on football matches across Africa, Asian, American and European Leagues including Asian League, English Premiership, Italian Serie A,Spanish La Liga, German Bundesliga, French Ligue 1 and Portugese Primeira Liga and it can be accessed by all Glo subscribers via SMS, USSD, and Web.

To subscribe to the daily plan costing just N50 subscribers will either dial the USSD Command *7023# or send the keyword “KPRD” to the shortcode “7023” or send the keyword “KPW” to the shortcode “7023” to subscribe to the weekly plan of N150. An SMS with a link to access the service will be sent to the subscribers upon successful subscription.

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2024 Budget: Report Shows NASS Allocated N6.6trn ‘Untraceable Projects’ to Ministries

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A new report which studied the breakdown of the 2024 budget passed by the 10th National Assembly (NASS) says unknown projects worth N6.6 trillion were discovered.

The suspended Senator Abdul Ningi (Bauchi Central) first accused his colleagues of padding the Appropriation Act. The lawmakers had approved N8,447,887,443,379 for several capital projects to be executed by 20 federal ministries.

A document titled “Final Summary Analysis of the Harmonized 2024 Budget (Passed)”, produced by Microxpressions Consult and submitted to the legislature, gave an overview of the figures focusing on allocations to Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs).

In its analysis, Economic Confidential found that N2,486,098,619,722 budgeted for capital projects in more than 15 ministries was aggregated into regional projects, while N4,185,711,477,842 was alloted to projects without geographic identifiers, thus complicating monitoring.

The report said the allocation to the South-West was N419,917,163,300, the South-East got N537,086,249,684; South-South – N224,969,978,366, North-West – N365,387,892,588, North-East – N349,434,063,602, and North-Central – N730,029,622,125.

“Surprisingly, N6,671,810,092,564 (out of the N8,447,887,443,379), approximately 71.98% of the total ‘Development Capital Allocation’, was assigned to initiatives that are either elusive in terms of traceability or encumbered by accountability constraints,” it noted.

Ministry of Youths: A total of N5,096,411,496 was budgeted for projects across all zones but locations of projects worth N2,868,851,764 were not indicated; Ministry of Sports: N21,614,361,733 earmarked for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N7,464,061,733 not named.

Ministry of Defence: N3,762,721,808,585 set aside for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N3,280,130,880,602 not mentioned; Ministry of Special Duties: N10,770,986,503 budgeted for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N4,672,818,582 not identified.

Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning: N2,293,112,174,749 allocated for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N383,729,998,776 not stated; Ministry of Tourism: N15,358,369,171 pegged for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N1,206,655,625 not disclosed.

Ministry of Petroleum Resources: N8,622,741,732 approved for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N8,554,622,753 not mentioned; Ministry of Women Affairs: N12,055,872,158 earmarked for projects across all zones, location of projects worth N4,382,888,112 were revealed.

Ministry of Justice: N33,860,593,566 budgeted for projects across all zones, location of projects worth N25,742,716,841 not identified; Ministry of Police Affairs: N99,382,436,919 alloted to projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N49,090,806,535 not disclosed.

Ministry of Agriculture: N895,398,209,400 earmarked for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N124,131,394,058 not indicated; Ministry of Environment: N75,200,361,462 allocated for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N55,278,212,086 not mentioned.

Ministry of Solid Minerals: N26,911,766,878 set aside for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N21,524,219,531 not identified; Ministry of Works: N987,289,797,899 earmarked for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N44,428,040,905 not stated.

Ministry of Water Resources: N281,591,884,394 budgeted for projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N54,120,180,977 not disclosed; Ministry of Health: N539,413,163,575 alloted to projects across all zones, locations of projects worth N146,215,196,278 not revealed.

Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy: A total of N4,893,877,166 was approved for various capital projects across all zones but locations of projects worth N3,646,711,848 were not indicated.

“The ministries must provide declarations regarding projects’ intended locations and scope in the interest of transparency and accountability,” according to Microxpressions Consult. “A stringent location-specific allocation protocol is critical to ensuring that budgetary provisions translate into traceable developmental advancements.”

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