Marketing Leaders Forum Nigeria

Declan joined Brand Finance in 2016 as an Analyst. During his time at the company he has progressed to his current role as a Valuations Director at Brand Finance Plc and a Director of Brand Finance Africa.

Declan leads Brand Finance in Financial Services, with particularly focus on the banking sector. Declan leads the team that produces the annual Most Valuable Global Banking Brands study in collaboration with The Banker magazine (the FT). He has both written and contributed to various industry thought leadership and academic papers, and is regular speaker at various conferences such as the IAA Africa Rising conference.

Declan has extensive experience in market research, brand and business valuation, brand strategy and positioning, sponsorship evaluation and brand architecture. Declan's clients include ABSA, Access Bank, Citi Bank, TD Bank, First National Bank, Royal Bank of Canada, QNB among others.

Declan is a qualified Chartered Accountant with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England Wales, having previously studied at the University of Cape Town in South Africa graduating with a Bachelor of Business Science in Finance with Economics.

Idorenyen is a proven reform minded business leader with demonstrable expertise in Strategy, Business Management, Organisational Design, Marketing, Sales Operations and is a licensed practitioner of Insights Discovery and Liberating Leadership UK.

Over the course of his illustrious career spanning over thirty years, Idy as he is fondly called has held key positions of increasing responsibility at Executive Management levels across Africa; building and transforming several global brands like Guinness (a subsidiary of Diageo) as a Brand Manager, Coca-Cola as the Country Marketing Manager in Kenya, Chief of Staff to the Equatorial Africa President, then later driving the business in the East & Central Region as General Manager before moving on to turn-around Cadbury from a near comatose state to profitability as Commercial Director. He had an exceptional stint at Samsung Electronics where he served as Managing Director for Nigeria out of its West Africa Hub in Lagos, and later served as the Managing Director for L’Oreal where he managed subsidiaries of the beauty giant across West Africa.

His exemplary leadership and service in the course of his career put him on a global stage. Idy was elected and served on the Executive Committee of the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) as Region Vice President for Africa, alongside other Chief Marketing Officers and Chief Executives of Fortune 500 companies between 2011 and March 2016. He is a Past President of the Advertisers Association of Nigeria, a Past Chairman of the Heads of Advertising Sectorial Group; a former member of Council at APCON (the Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria), which regulates the practice of Advertising in Nigeria. He sits on the Advisory Boards of Awesome Treasures Foundation (ATF), Strap & Safe Child Foundation, Strategy for Mentoring Initiative & Leadership Empowerment (S.M.I.L.E) and the Consumer Advocacy for Food Safety & Nutrition Initiative (CAFSANI). He also serves as a Board member of several companies in the Finance, Consulting and Communication sectors.

Over the past two decades, Idy’s relentless pursuit of improving the public good within the larger society and professional communities of practice has been recognised with Fellowships of UK’s Chartered Institute of Marketing and the National Institute of Marketing Nigeria, where he currently functions as the President and Chairman of the Governing Council. He has also been adorned with several awards in the course of his career and service to his community.

He is currently the CEO of Corporate Shepherds Limited, an organisation founded by him to serve as a social enterprise to develop and enhance people and organisational capability. Driven by a performance and productivity mind set, he runs a bundle of initiatives in the media and open seminars for grooming leaders and young people to improve their competencies and career prospects. Corporate Shepherds currently has a wide array of youths and numerous Executives under its mentorship. He also hosts a popular radio program tagged ‘Navigate with Idy’, a leadership and business talk show that airs on over ten different radio stations across the nation.

Idy is a trained Economist and holds an MBA with specialty in Marketing. He is a much sought-after Speaker in business and leadership conferences. He enjoys reading, listening to music and travelling.

Nsima Ogedi-Alakwe is a Business Leader and Marketing Professional, the Principal Consultant at Gotcha Communications Limited, a people-first, technology-driven Marketing Communications firm. She is the recent Marketing Director at Unilever - where she led Marketing Strategy and Innovation to drive growth across various brands and categories in Africa.

Nsima has built diverse experience in building brands across Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) Markets to deliver outstanding results. Her over two-decade long career spans Quality Assurance, Brand Building, Planning, Project Management, Marketing and Business Strategy. Her recent leadership roles at Unilever include Foods & Refreshment Director, Marketing Director Foods, Tea Platform Marketing Director.

Nsima obtained her Bachelor of Science degree from University of Nigeria, Nsukka. She is an alumna of Lagos Business School, Pan-Atlantic University; Member, Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON); Member, Institute of Directors, a WIMBOARD Fellow at IE Business School, a Fellow, National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria (NIMN).

Nsima is a strong advocate for gender and talent diversity in the workplace and has championed coaching and mentoring initiatives that has promoted positive externalities within the industry and her community.  Her purpose is to inspire with calm, to unlock hidden potentials and nurture talents for today and for the future. She is a trained Mental Health Champion.

She is a Foodie with interest in promoting family values, writing, photography, wellness and nature. She loves to teach and work with children and young people. She is married to Kizito and a joyful mother to the FantasticFive+.

Louis Ifeanyi Nzegwu is a Professor of Marketing at the Lagos Business School. Prior to joining the Lagos Business School Faculty, Professor Nzegwu was a Professor of Marketing and the Executive Director of the International Business Resource Center (IBRC) at the University of Wisconsin – Platteville (UW – Platteville), on the faculty of Business Administration at Alcorn State University, Lorman, Mississippi from 1981 until 1991. He also held visiting Professorship positions at the University of Dubuque Iowa USA, Wartburg College USA and University of Kigali, Rwanda.

Nzegwu earned his Doctorate Degree in Business Administration from Nova Southern University, MBA from Morgan State University, M.Ed. from University of Southern Mississippi, and MSc in Agricultural Economics from Alcorn State University. He is a recipient of several teaching excellence and academic awards. In 2007, Nzegwu was named a Wisconsin Teaching Scholar by the University of Wisconsin System, an honor given to outstanding faculty members in the University of Wisconsin System. In 2006, Nzegwu led the UW-Platteville IBRC to receive the State of Wisconsin’s distinguished Governor’s Export Achievement Award—an award presented to organizations that assisted Wisconsin Businesses achieve significant

Nzegwu has consulted for several organizations: both profit and non-profit and has been involved in a series of management development programs with market planning groups, especially in global business strategies. improvement in promoting exports. His research interest is in the areas of marketing strategy, product development, marketing entry strategy, consumer behavior and sales enablement. He has served on the editorial board of The Journal of African Business, as Associate Editor of the Emerald Emerging Market Case Studies as well as on the advisory board of the Academy of World Business, Marketing & Management. Nzegwu is an Emeritus Professor of Marketing with the University of Wisconsin, USA and fellow of The National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria.

Uchenna Uzo is a Professor of Marketing and Academic Director of the Africa Retail Academy at Lagos Business School. He is also the Faculty Director of LBS and has received several awards for teaching excellence in Africa. He founded Afritail and is a researcher interested in retail, consumer behaviour and indigenous marketing practices in Africa. Uchenna's articles have appeared in several international journals, and he serves on the Management Board of LBS as well as other boards.

Adetunji Adeyinka is the Group Managing Director of The Republicom Group; a full-service agency group with an inspired agenda to transform businesses in Africa by offering strategic
business, marketing and communication solutions to meet their needs in a new digital age.

Tunji has worked on different brands in several sectors covering Technology, Telecommunications, FMCG, Finance, Healthcare, Hospitality for over thirty years. The Republicom Group provides services covering Communications, Consulting, Technology and Strategy.

Tunji’s work experience has covered the agency business where he worked in MC&A Saatchi & Saatchi, Tequila Nigeria, Rosabel and Connect Marketing Services. He also has some experience in telecommunications where he worked for seven years in Marketing.

Tunji has a Masters in International Relations from University of Ife and an MBA from the IESE Business School, Spain. His first degree was obtained in English and History from the University of Ilorin in 1989.

He is the President of the Experiential Marketers Association of Nigeria.

David began his career in brand management at SmithKline Beecham (now GSK) in 1992 and worked on brands such as Aquafresh, Lucozade and Med Lemon. He successfully launched Tums into the South African market and very unsuccessfully launched Ribena.

He moved into advertising in 1995 at TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris as a strategic planner and later stumbled into client service. Through the years he worked on brands such as Standard Bank, BMW, Land Rover, Nissan, Reckitt Benckiser, Nandos, Apple, SAA, SA Tourism and Visa. He managed to convince clients to approve work that won Loerie Grand Prix’s, a few Cannes Lions and a host of APEX Effectiveness awards. He left in 2007 after a 5 year stint as Managing Director.

He joined Standard Bank as Marketing Director: Africa and was part of building their Africa franchise with acquisitions in Nigeria and Kenya.

In 2010 David moved to Kenya to become CMO of Standard Chartered Bank in Africa before returning to South Africa in 2013 to join Barclays Africa Group (Absa), primarily to oversee the change of Absa in South Africa to Barclays.

Post the Barclays PLC announcement to sell their operations in Africa, David headed the team that reimagined and guided the organisation through the successful rebrand and relaunch of the Absa Group.

He left Absa in April 2022 and is running a brand and marketing consultancy, In2Sight Consulting.

He is currently representing Brand Finance in Africa as the Business Development Director and is a Board Member of Hilton College.

He has a Bachelor of Commerce degree in Marketing, Economics and Law; but more importantly is the father of 2 boys; he loves to run, ride a mountain bike and can be found fishing on a river somewhere whenever possible.

Amaechi Michael Okobi is the Chief Brand and Communications Officer for Access Corporation. In this role, he oversees the positioning of the Access Corporation brand, including all banking and non-banking subsidiaries, across various markets. Prior to this role, Amaechi served as the Group Head of Corporate Communications for Access Bank, a position he held since joining the organization in 2014.

Amaechi is a marketing and communications professional with over 25 years of experience with global and Nigerian retail brands such as Revlon Inc., Nigerian Breweries Plc, Globacom Ltd, and Diageo Plc. His experience cuts across marketing; communications; brand management; market growth strategy; reputation management; and public relations.

Amaechi recently led the communications and media relations efforts for CACOVID (the Coalition Against COVID-19), a special task force comprising leadership from the Central Bank of Nigeria; Deposit Money Banks and key stakeholders in Nigeria’s private sector, which was established to support Nigeria’s private and public healthcare’s efforts towards alleviating the effects of the pandemic.

Amaechi obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Administration from the George Washington University, Washington, DC., and has attended several professional development programs. He is a fellow of the National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria (NIMN) and an Honorary Senior Member of the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN).

He has received a number of other recognitions, including ‘Corporate Communications Professional of the Year Award’ at the Corporate Communications Awards, 2017; ‘Most Outstanding Corporate Communications Professional (Financial Services)’ at the 2021 Brandcom Awards; and ‘COVID-19 Response Banker of the Year’ at the 2021 CIBN Annual Bankers’ Dinner.