NewAfricanWoman Issue 49 - Flipbook - Page 6
ON THE COVER
IN CONVERSATION WITH
Senior Director – Africa Investment Forum
In a wide-ranging interview, Chinelo
Anohu, discusses various issues close
to her heart, from promoting Women
as Investment Champions, connecting
women-led businesses to 昀椀nance,
her career journey, the AIF and her
mandate as its SD, and much more.
Interview by reGina Jane Jere
Woman
2023
New African
Woman
2023
6 l6Newl African
l March
l March
C
hinelo is poised and eloquent throughout
our
interview.
Knowledgeable
and
convincing on the topics of our discussion.
She evidently knows her stuff. The fact that she is
a corporate law graduate with a Master’s degree
in Computer and Telecommunications Law
perhaps makes for her intellectual demeanour.
Twice honoured as one of the most influential
Africans by the long-running New African
magazine and of course by this publication,
Chinelo is lauded as one of the continent’s gosetting go-getters who walk the talk, and her
career path is a testament to that.
She has worked in the public sector such as the
Nigerian Bureau of Public Enterprises where she
was part of the team behind the reforms that
successfully implemented the privatisation of
state-owned public enterprises, as well as the
private sector starting in Chevron Nigeria.
In 2014 she was appointed Director General of
the National Pension Commission of Nigeria
(PenCom) becoming the first woman to hold that
position — one which she reflects on with honesty
and pride. “It was hard but exhilarating work.
We first had to draft the Pension Reform Bill,
then shepherd it through the National Assembly
for passage into law and thereafter set up the
National Pension Commission… it wasn’t easy.”
She adds however: “But we were extremely
lucky to have the political will of the then
President Olusegun Obasanjo behind us, and his
unflinching support every step of the way. He was
quite resolute that under his watch, the pension
problem was going to be tackled once and for all,
and so it was.” ▶