Nigerian born international CEO, Adebayo Ogunlesi has now
ceased to be an adviser to embattled US President Donald Trump. Trump sacked
him today along with other distinguished CEOs counselling him via two councils
on how to “Make America Great Again”.
Adebayo Ogunlesi: to advise Trump on the economy
Trump sacked Ogunlesi on Twitter, when he announced the
dissolution of two business advisory councils, in one fell swoop.
Ogunlesi was a member of Strategic and Policy Forum, one of
the two disbanded by the unpredictable president. The other group was the
Manufacturing Jobs Initiative Council.
Ogunlesi, heads Global Infrastructure Partners, a private
equity firm and one of Fortune 500 companies. He was the only African on the
panel.
The New York Times reported before Trump’s tweeted
dissolution, that members of Ogunlesi’s panel were debating dissolving the body
entirely as Trump wallowed deeper into bigotry quagmire. But Trump preempted
their move.
“Corporate leaders had hoped that President Trump would help
businesses by slashing taxes and gutting regulations. It is not clear how much
he will deliver on that score. On top of that, he is putting many chief
executives in the position of answering for a president with an unparalleled
track record of outraging people, most recently at a contentious press
conference on Tuesday when he drew a false equivalence between the white
supremacists who protested in Charlottesville, Va., last weekend and
counter-protesters.”, NYT reported.
Trump had earned rebuke and isolation from business leaders
for supporting racial bigotry, White Supremacists and the KKK, following his
remarks that failed to blame the tragic violence in Charlottesville, Virginia
on the group. Instead, he blamed all the sides and the group that challenged
the racists.
The leaders of three companies — Kenneth Frazier of Merck,
Kevin Plank of Under Armour and Brian Krzanich of Intel — were the first to
resign from the Manufacturing Jobs Initiative Council.
They resigned on Monday because Mr. Trump was slow to
condemn the white supremacists during the weekend and blamed “many sides” for
the violence.
When Trump moderated his tone on Monday by saying “racism is
evil” and condemning neo-Nazis, he did not assuage some of the CEOs working
with him.
Scott Paul, the president of the Alliance for American
Manufacturing, an organization backed by the steel industry and the United
Steelworkers resigned. he was followed on Tuesday by Richard Trumka and Thea
Lee, the president and deputy chief of staff for the union group A.F.L.-C.I.O..
The latter’s resignation followed Trump’s reversed position at a press
conference at Trump Tower in New York, in which he said that “not all of those
people were neo-Nazis, believe me,” referring to the white nationalists who
were chanting “Jews will not replace us” as they marched with tiki-torches.
Ogunlesi’s Strategic Forum, composed some of America’s most
highly respected and successful business leaders.
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