England won their ticket to the quarterfinals of the ongoing FIFA World Cup thanks to David Beckham who has established himself as an expert in free kicks. The game was a normal one until a player was brought down in an area generally known as Beckham’s terriotory. The referee gave a free kick, which Beckham took and it resulted into the only goal of the match.
Beckham  is at his turf when it comes to free kicks in this particular terrain he has created and branded has his own.
On the home front-
Bernard Longe’s territory is managing large companies. He rose through the ranks in First Bank to become the bank’s M.D. He made decisions for the bank to invest in telecomms. Some of the deal did not go through and he was fired. Afterwards, multinationals chased him about with juicy management positions. It was rumored that V-mobile offered him a high position, which he rejected. The papers announced later that he became the Chief Operating Officer of Dangote Group. Months afterwards, he was announced as the MD of Transcorp (Nigeria’s newest and biggest home grown multinational).
Suddenly, Bernard is the ‘Darling of the private sector.’
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When public policy is discussed, few names ring a bell. Obiangeli Ezekwesili has made outstanding achievement in her short romance with the public office.We only need to trail her footsteps from the Due Process office, which she helped conceptualize and establish, to the Ministry of Solid Minerals, which she reformed and rebranded in months, as if she worked with a magic wand. She also helped conceptualize and put into motion the National Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), which pushed for the auditing of Nigeria’s oil account for the first time since only God knows when!
These remarkable people-Beckham, Oby and Longe have established their success on finding that ‘area’ in which they are good at, concentrated on it, developed it well so that when it comes to that ‘niche of theirs’ they are experts.
The gist is simple- If only young people would take a leave from these kind of people and apply Paretto’s principle which l would simple put as follows:
 “If young people can find the 20% of our talent which amounts to 80% of our success, concentrate, build and work on it towards perfection, then we would have successfully created a niche for ourselves that everyone would automatically use us as a reference point to describe our area of specialtyâ€.
Some, would automatically reply me by saying that our country has not encouraged the firm establishment of its youths, my answer to that statement is in the words of George Bernard Shaw
“People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. The people who get on in life are those are people who get up and look for the circumstances they want and if they can’t find them, they make them…â€
I see in this generation of ours, the need to create our own terrain of success, its time to call the shots, its time for us to take our destiny in our hands by tapping into our talent and making difference.
Its time to create our own ‘Beckham’s Territory’
Thanks
Ewajesu Asala
July 2nd, 2006
