Chief Dr. Abel Kprogidi Ubeku (24 February 1936 - 9 March 2014) was a Nigerian business executive who was a presidential aspirant during the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

primary in 1992, a member of the Committee for National Consensus (CNC) during the Abacha transition program and also former Guinness Nigeria Managing Director.

Personal life

Ubeku hailed from Araya, in the Isoko community of

Delta State Delta is a States of Nigeria, state in the South South (Nigeria), South-South geopolitical zone of Nigeria. Named after the Niger Delta—a large part of which is in the state—the state was formed from the former Bendel State, on 27 August 1 ...

. He was educated at University of London finishing with a Master of Laws degree in 1971, he obtained a PhD from

University of Sussex The University of Sussex is a public university, public research university, research university located in Falmer, East Sussex, England. It lies mostly within the city boundaries of Brighton and Hove. Its large campus site is surrounded by the ...

and his thesis published in 1983 was titled ''Industrial Relations in Developing Countries: The Case of Nigeria''. After completing his A-Level from Nigeria College of Arts, Science and Technology,

Ibadan Ibadan (, ; ) is the Capital city, capital and most populous city of Oyo State, in Nigeria. It is the List of Nigerian cities by population, third-largest city by population in Nigeria after Lagos and Kano (city), Kano, with a total populatio ...

, he started working as a primary school teacher in 1956, not motivated to continue teaching and interested in leadership roles, he joined Nigeria Tobacco Company in 1961 as a trainee, later becoming a personnel officer. He was promoted personnel manager in 1966 and served in that position until 1971 when he was appointed executive secretary of the Industrial Training Fund. After a couple of years with the fund, he was employed at Guinness Nigeria as the country Personnel Manager, he became a director in the company in 1975 and was appointed the first Nigeria managing director in 1982, the same year the Harp brewery in Ogba was completed. In 1986, Guinness launched Merit lager beer produced exclusively from locally available raw materials and to differentiate the international brands such as

Stout Stout is a type of dark beer that is generally warm fermented, such as dry stout, oatmeal stout, milk stout and imperial stout. Stout is a type of ale. The first known use of the word "stout" for beer is in a document dated 1677 in the E ...

and

Harp The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orchestras or ...

produced by the company. After leaving, Guinness, Ubeku took on leadership roles within the Isoko community. He was the treasurer of the People's Solidarity Party and later presidential candidate in the 1992 SDP primary. In 1997, he was chairman of the now defunct Committee of National Consensus, one of the political parties during the

Sani Abacha Sani Abacha (; (20 September 1943 – 8 June 1998) was a Nigerian military dictator and statesman who ruled Nigeria with an iron fist as military head of state from 1993 following a palace coup d'état until his death in 1998. Abacha's seiz ...

administration. He died on 9 March 2014 and was buried in his hometown of Araya.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ubeku, Abel Candidates in the 1993 Nigerian presidential election 20th-century Nigerian businesspeople Alumni of the University of London People from Delta State 1936 births 2014 deaths