Today is the anniversary of his birth and many of his friends and associates would have different things to say about him. As a staff of one of his companies, THE WHISTLER Newspapers, I want to celebrate one of his special attributes—his third eye!
The first time I met him, someone was trying to blackmail one of his clients. The guy claimed to be a journalist with TELL Magazine. I was then an associate editor with the magazine and he wanted to be sure the guy was a staff of the magazine. That was in 2016.
He set up a meeting and we discovered the guy, obviously in his late forties, was not a journalist but carried a fake TELL Magazine ID card. We left him at the police station where he was detained for further questioning.
But while driving back, Chief Ume started a light-hearted chat in the car, and before dropping me off, he said casually: I want you to work with me! It was a statement rather than a question. I hadn’t even known anything about him then. His request took me aback. It wasn’t even a request, because he didn’t ask if I would like to work with him. I told him I would think about it, but kept wondering why he thought I would leave TELL Magazine and join an online newspaper that was barely known at the time. But several years later, I found the answer!
Chief Ume has a gift that many ordinary people don’t have. He has a third eye! Ike Abam has a spiritual gift that many may not know. He’s a deeply spiritual person who appears on the outside as a Yuppie. He’s a social climber who recognizes God’s dominance on the affairs of men. This is why he seems to see the soul of people when he interacts with them. He brings you closer when his spirit accepts you.
I remember when we needed to hire a reporter with strong investigative skills. I got a young guy on the recommendation of some editors. We interviewed him and felt he could do the job.
When I took him to Chief Ume, he spoke with the boy for a few minutes and told him we would get back to him. After the guy left, he told me we would not be hiring him. I asked why, and his response was that his spirit did not accept the guy! That’s the third eye!
There seems to be a positive inner voice that directs and pushes him to do stuff. Many of his staff would confirm this.
That is why he has achieved the success he has today. Everyone who has worked with him have remained with him. He gives you no reason to leave his job. He’s also not the boss that threatens his staff with sack all the time. Instead, he’s more interested in why you’re not performing. He doesn’t owe salaries and spends money on regular training for his staff. Only a handful of media houses, if any, can boast the same welfare for their staff.
As a person, he’s also a fantastic human being. I have since met many of his friends who gave interesting testimonies about “the grace” that God gave him. Everyone has some story to tell about him and why he’s a special person to them. This is a man who doesn’t forget his friends.
I’m still amazed till today how he manages to know all his staff without interacting with them on a daily basis. He could say something about the work ethic or character of his staff despite not having the time to come to the office. This year, I’m not sure he has been in the office up to four times! He reminds me all the time about the “Big Brother” in George Orwell’s Animal Farm who has total control of what goes on in the farm without anyone seeing him.
But unlike George Orwell’s Big Brother, Chief Ume is not the tyrannical leader who demands absolute obedience.
Chief Ume is a humanist who shows interest in people generally. He likes young people who bring their A game to their job. When he sees potential in you and you don’t live up to it, he gets closer to know what your obstacles are and help you eliminate them.
Staff can disagree with him without feeling their jobs threatened. He even seems to relish such disagreements when they have sound professional basis. He rewards staff according to their productivity, not seniority. Sometimes he sends gifts to reporters when he feels they’ve done a good job to encourage them to achieve more excellence.
It is his love for humanity that moved him to establish the Unubiko Foundation, a Nigerian non-profit, philanthropic organization dedicated to supporting underprivileged communities and align with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The foundation has given hundreds of scholarships to tertiary school students, empowered several young people and women, and executed life-saving projects in several communities in Abia State.
On August 21, 2026 when he was honoured with the prestigious African Hero Award at the 15th edition of the Voice African Achievers Awards in London, his only comment after thanking the organisers was that he would do more to bring education to all parts of Abia State.
Let us all celebrate a man who measures his fortune solely by what he could give away. To him, gold is a silent, heavy thing until it is converted into human happiness. He’s living a life that transforms his immense resources into bridges of opportunity for others.
He did not merely fund charities from a distance; he looked people in the eye, listened to their stories with a quiet, arresting reverence, and sought out the hidden brilliance in those whom the world had overlooked.
He carries the effortless elegance of someone whose heart is infinitely larger than his bank account. For this man, loving humanity is not a obligation of his status, but the very oxygen of his existence.
Let us all celebrate a humanist, philanthropist and an uncommon media entrepreneur. Happy birthday Ike Abam.
Tajudeen Suleiman is the Managing Editor of thewhistler.ng
(The Whistler)
