Prince Edward Okotiebhor (CEO Bamisoro Telecom) @ The Entrepreneur

I Started Bamisoro Telecom With Phone Repairs – CEO Bamisoro Telecom

My name is Prince Edward Okotiebhor I was born in Warri Delta State I was born into a polygamous. As at 1986, my father had 36 wives and all of them resided in the same compound. Then I was in class five; as a matter of fact there was discipline and principles in our family. No child must say he or she has one mother. My mother happened to be a very good nurse in those days in service and I love her so much.

I attended 14 different primary schools and 8 secondary schools in different states not because I’m a dullard but because I fell in love with traveling with my mother anytime she was on transfer she happened to be a very good nurse, so she was transferred every 2 months, before you know it I was off with her unknown to me that what I was doing was affecting my education. After finishing secondary school, she wanted me to become a Medical Doctor, I also wished the same, along the line I got admitted to the University of Benin to Study Pharmacy, after sometime I got an information that my admission has been terminated because my name was fished out has one of the people who spearheaded an illegal movement while fighting for our right when I was in secondary school.

I prevented the information from getting to my mum. So I took a decision to obtain a shell scholarship examination, I passed it and I was admitted into Petroleum Training Institute to study welding and Engineering, I have a Higher National Diploma (HND).

Funny enough, I graduated from the school before my mum got to know I did not attend University of Benin. “I got a job offer from Shell immediately I finished my studies, they were ready to pay me a sum of one hundred and fifty-two thousand naira a month but I did no take it. Knowing fully well that no other offer existed but I knew inside of me that, that was not my purpose for going to school in the first place. After some time, I met a friend who was a driver with Guinness, he was making money, one day he told me he would be traveling to Lagos, and I joined him on the trip because I have never been to Lagos. On our way he stopped to load bananas and he asked me to join them.

Going to Lagos on the second time, I met some of my friends hope of getting any job to survive. I got a job as a cleaner in a hotel. It was a dirty job but I made sure my job was done perfectly because it was part of our core values at PTI. It got to an extent that my boss started increasing my salary just because there is always a difference in whatever I did. After some months with the hotel I left the place for a night club at Allen Avenue own by Onanbolu’s I worked there as a supervisor.

I met a white gentleman who asked me to work in his casino outfit. He offered me $200 for the first 2 weeks of training, after which he would double the salary, I was excited and I jumped at the offer but after working for just 2 days I discovered he was cheating me. In a single day we made about N2 million as a matter of fact our patrons were military socialites I mean prominent Nigerians who will come at night.

The dream of ever young Nigerian was to travel out of the country so I saved some money and traveled to Italy. When I got there I explored the place and their fashion but after some time I realized I did not fit in so I came back to Nigeria.”

After spending about 2 years in Nigeria, it dawned on me that Nigeria was dry, I could not see anything which makes life comfortable in other countries like internet mobile phones, meanwhile, I was told by a Ghanaian friend I met in Italy that Ghana has embraced Information Technology, I said to myself, was it not Ghanaians that Nigeria was deporting to their country years back. I decided to pay him a visit in Ghana. After learning about Internet technology I got a job in an Internet office, where I also learnt Internet configuration. I also learnt how to work with masts but I discovered that their mast were not strong enough to last for 3 years. I realized that then none of the Universities in Ghana had course on mast building. Fortunately, I was connected to a man whose job is to build mast and on hearing of my knowledge of welding, construction and engineering he started given me jobs that he himself could not handle, that was how I started making money.

Returning to Nigeria was really exciting because I saw gaps needed to be filled in the telecommunications industry. The time I came back Internet technology was operational in Lagos, then it was a dialogue system. I met with the owner of one of the Internet Service Providers, after sharing my experience with him on advanced Internet calling and some other technicalities that could boost his business, he didn’t let me go. He offered me the sum of N200, 000 per month and I agreed. I started designing masts for him and installing them at different locations in Lagos, by the time he discovered that I could configure phone jerk to enhance the voice quality and a lesser tariff he added more money to my salary and job description. When wireless phones came on board, we ventured into it as well and people come from different places to make calls.

One man Hon. Olusoji Oluwatokesi met me one fateful day and asked if it can work in Ibadan and I told why not, on that same day he asked me if I could help him set up a cyber café for his wife, and he gave me a cheque of eight million naira, I could not believe it until I withdrew one hundred thousand naira out of it. He promised to call back in a month’s time but I did not see him.

We met again after some months and I set-up for him the first cyber café in Ibadan located at challenge. After some months of operation I discovered that we could open computer accessories store. Later we added the sale of recharge cards and repairing of phones even when Ibadan was still laid back in the skill of phone repairs. It is surprising that I did not earn a salary within the two years within the two years I signed with the man because our agreement was that the profit would be shared on a 70-30% basis each time I talked to him concerning my share he would say we have made no profit two years down the line nothing was coming in as my share except if I demanded for some money from him but we were making money. After sometime I started noticing that I was being pushed out of the business and decision making level when his brothers came from school to join the business but I did not mind I kept establishing more branches for them. But they kept tossing me about and transferring me from one branch to another until one day the wife of the man I was working for asked me to resign my appointment and I did,

I started thinking of what to do, I couldn’t go back to Lagos. Where would I start? I was confused after some months, I just decided to walk around Dugbe and Challenge axis, then I saw a flat, a cyber café owner wanted to sublet it for N100, 000 I was really broke but I knew in my mind that I can start doing something. I have the skill to repair phones but money became a problem, depression crept in but I kept motivating myself; fortunately, I began to see my former boss friends, whenever they see me they would appreciate me and give me some money, it was these money that I saved to pay for the office. There was no furnishing for the new office and no working tool except my skill of G.S.M. I can boldly say that I am the first G.S.M. engineer in Ibadan. As at that time, 9 years ago, mobile phone was new in Nigeria and very few in Ibadan. Ibadan people were still ignorant of how to even fix their pin lock, security code which is in their sim pack fortunately on my first day of operation I realized N28, 000.

“I used to have a old alcohol as a friend who used to ask me why I didn’t smoke nor drink; on this particular day, he asked me the same question but then I could not speak Yoruba, so I told him that “Baba o gbadun” (old man you are not well) meanwhile what I wanted to say was that “Baba Ongbadu” (meaning old man,you are enjoying) immediately I made that statement the man slapped me, I kept wondering why he slapped me, I kept wondering why he slapped me but people who knew me as a good friend of the man called me and asked what happened? I was hearing ‘Basoro, bamisoro now omo Igbo’. So later after the show I asked a friend what ‘Basoro’ and ‘Bamisoro’ meant? He told me but I did not have any idea of what to do with it but by the time I opened my first shop of G.S.M repair office I discovered that 80% of my customers did not understand English. I was thinking on which name to write on the chalkboard, ‘bamisoro’ came to my mind so I wrote “BAMISORO Repair your phone while you wait.”

When people came in, they were expecting to see a Yoruba man but by the time they saw me. They realized I didn’t even understand Yoruba language but I had some boys who would quickly ask them what they wanted, after a while my customers started asking me to help them buy good phones, I did not have enough money, so I would collect money from them and buy from Lagos. Within 2 months of involving in this business I realized N250, 000 that was the money I used to start BAMISORO telecom; I bought office furniture stocked my office phones; one day I came to the office and everything was empty, not even a chair was spared. So I stated all over again by selling phones. The two months after, burglars came back again and cleared the whole thing. I thought of going back to Lagos but I remembered that Lagos itself was not safe. I had conviction that I would make something out of this place because I knew there was something in it for me.

I knew that what attracted the thieves were the phones so I decided to stop selling phones and returned to phone repair. During one of my trips to Lagos to get some materials, I met the woman whom I used to buy phones from and she asked me why I have not been coming and I told her about the robbery incidents and she told me it happens every where, she gave me phones worth N2 million within 2 days on credit. I decided to keep them in a police station, but they refused to allow my goods to be kept there. At last I met an Igbo man who was the Area Commander Personal Assistant, he allowed me to use his office outside the police station. The step I took was to transport the phones to the office and back again to my friend’s shop after the close of business but one day there was no vehicle to transport the goods back so I decided to keep them in my office. These thieves gained access to the place and took half of all the phones and left; it was really a sad period of my life, “The following day one Alfa who was aware of the incident asked me if I pay my tithe, I was surprised a Muslim challenging me about tithe.

To be sincere as at that time I don’t pay tithe, my belief was that it is pastors that spends it on their family, so with that challenge my orientation changed, but the problem I had was that I did not know how to calculate it with such a loss. Secondly, the loss was so much that I could not afford to pay my tithe immediately because it was enormous, but I made it my goal If that is only part of business I did not know, I started experience peace and enlargement the day I started paying tithe.

Prince Edward talking about his challenges like every successful entrepreneur, he said, “my only challenges is staff problem and whenever I ask my colleague in business they keep telling me it’s a general phenomenon. Infact it’s a tasking job managing about 83 staffs.” Responding to how he has been managing his public figure as a business man and a socialite, “it was not a problem for me because where I am coming from, my mother used to tell me that if you humble yourself God would left you up, infact many people don’t know me facially if not for my club LeMERVEILLE because I try to be myself despite my accomplishments.