Insight Magazine Issue 1 2018

“Communications are the most important
component of nation building,” he believes.
“We are a youth focused organisation. We have
pioneered an entertainment focused approach to
encourage young people to use their voices and
learn new skills.”
The organisation is subscription based with around 62 members in Sierra Leone and roughly 200 around the world.
In 2004 AWOL launched the National Achievement Awards. The organisation is also building a school in Gondama, Bo
District. “We visited the area in 2011 to give out scholarships and discovered that it had no primary school,” Navo recalls.
“The children were using a mosque for their lessons and whenever there were prayers, they were sent out.” There are
plans to build a recreational centre when the school is completed.
His approach has paid off. He regularly pushes the boundaries. As well as the newspaper, radio and TV station, there
is an AYV app for TV and radio. He has the technology to be able to do live broadcasts. This was put to particularly good
use during the Presidential Candidates’ Debate. He says he has captured audience figures of 35% of the country’s TV
watching public.
“Communications are the most important component of nation building,” he believes. “We are a youth focused
organisation. We have pioneered an entertainment focused approach to encourage young people to use their voices and
learn new skills.”
He has a particular skill for picking the right people. Ex pats - Angela Angwenyi, Tony and Habib Munzir have been a
positive addition to the AYV team. Navo gives them a free hand and emphasises that skills transfer is included in their
terms of reference and that they all have Sierra Leonean deputies that they are training.
His development agenda is also evident in his association with the organisation - All Works of Life (AWOL), which was
founded after the war. He tells the story with a smile. “A few business people decided to establish an organisation called
First Class People to give back and offer scholarships and human rights’ interventions. I was at the lands registry to
complete a land purchase and bumped into the late Moseray Fadika. I told him all about the First Class People concept,
but he was completely opposed to the name. I managed to persuade him to come to the first meeting. He came along and
insisted that we change the name. We ended up with AWOL and in 2001 President Kabbah launched the organisation at
the British Council. Fadika was elected as the Founding Chair. I was the Financial Secretary and Chericoko was Secretary
General.
His relationship with the late Moseray Fadika was very important to him. He describes Fadika as “an inspiration, a
brother and a friend,” and he was hit hard by his death. As a fervent Muslim, he accepts Fadika’s death as God’s will,
but admits that it was difficult. “Fadika’s death was untimely and a shock. I had the same feeling when I lost my father. I
almost gave up,” he recalls.
He didn’t and continues to build his portfolio. There are seven new studios, including London, Bo, Makeni and Freetown,
with two more due in Kono and Kenema. He is aiming for true national and international reach. He has recently launched
the country’s first Sunday newspaper, and to ensure uninterrupted coverage he has invested $200,000 into ensuring
the station is fully solar powered. “It will save us money in the long-term,” he says, and he is on the verge of adding an
entertainment channel to the AYV stable.
Asked what business advice he would offer to future entrepreneurs, he returns to his tried and tested formula. “I would
say always invoke P and P – it substantially increases your chances of success.” Focus is another of piece of advice that
he offers up and coming business people. “People will approach you for all kinds of personal reasons and personal gain.
They will attempt to undermine your success. They will gossip about you. It is important that you learn to close your ears
to these kinds of distractions and continue to hold onto your convictions.”
He is a family man. His wife is a lawyer with a speciality in commercial law and the couple have two children – boys of 12
and three. His circle of friends is small and trusted. “When I was in my twenties I became caught up in social groups and
having lots of friends,” he recalls. “I realised it wasn’t helpful and I changed. Now I keep to a small group of associates
and focus on my business.”
He is a man who takes his own advice, and watching his quiet hands-on team-led approach at the Presidential
Candidate’s Debate, it is clear that it has stood him in very good stead indeed.
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One of the first things AWOL did was to buy an X-Ray Machine for Connaught Hospital and refurbish the X-Ray
department.
“AWOL shows that home-grown institutions can substitute the aid dependency culture,” he says. “That we can come
together to achieve development projects. The organisation is composed of people who want to give back and we have
paid the school and university tuition fees of many members.”
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