Renowned historian, Keazor, joins Piql to address data challenges in W’Africa

The challenge of data in Africa, especially in the West African region is poised to change in the coming years following the appointment of renowned Nigerian-born historian and lawyer, Nze Ed Emeka Keazor to drive a subsidiary of a Norwegian innovative technology firm, Piql Africa Ltd in the region.

With the move, which brought Keazor to chair the board of Piql brand in West Africa, there are indications that Nigeria and other countries within the region would progress in data preservation and protection.

Piql, a Norwegian innovative technology firm offers a disruptive and holistic technology and solution for truly secure and long-term data storage for the archival/digital preservation, cybersecurity, and storage optimisation among others.

Executive Director, Piql Africa Ltd, Esona Onuoha while announcing the appointment of Keazor said his addition could only mean that the continent faces the historical archiving and preservation challenges in the region with a renowned and brilliant mind.

He disclosed that Keazor’s appointment meant that the board of directors had been seriously strengthened, saying that the historian is well-known and successful in the legal and history disciplines not only with established credentials but also with an eminent business career.

“Piql West Africa faces a historic opportunity offering its data preservation technology in the coming years within the region, and I believe that it now has both the leadership and management to prosper.

“I look forward to working with the board to reach our goals of providing data protection and preservation solutions to government, development agencies, and multinationals as the gold standard option for record preservation,” Onuoha said.

Speaking on the development, Founder and Managing Director of Piql, Rune Bjerkestrand said with the experience already gathered by Keazor and insights in the domain of archival and preservation, the lawyer would not only add value for Piql in Nigeria and West Africa but also globally across the network of Piql Partners.

Bjerkestrand said: “We share ambitions and visions, and together we shall make a true difference in providing the best possible solutions to keep memory and history well preserved for the benefit of future generations – for both institutions as well as businesses across West Africa.”

Keazor has had a long, illustrious international career as a distinguished historian, lawyer, museum curator, filmmaker and archivist. He joins the Piql family bringing many years of experience, innovation and ideas for the planning and structuring of archives, digitization of analogue content and offline plus online storage to our operations.

He is the founder of Eagle History Media, a member of the Board of Trustees of the Legal History Society of Nigeria, as well as Iba Ajie The Ukpabi Asika Knowledge Resource Centre; Fellow of the Royal Society for Arts and Associate Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a member of the Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators of Canada. His museum projects include the curation of the Total Energies, FirstBank mobile museums and the Iba Ajie Museum, amongst others. He was also a consultant to the Horniman Museum, London and provided pro-bono advice on the recent Benin bronzes restitution. He also received an award from the African Society of Cambridge University for his work in African history in 2014

Keazor is also a partner at Rose and Berkeley Chambers, Attorneys at Law and was previously publishing Director at the Cavendish Group and Legal Specialist at Age UK.. He has authored and published several books on Legal, Social and Commercial history, including the critically acclaimed „Lagos- Hamburg Line- A Short History of German Companies in Nigeria‟ and „120 Great Nigerians We Never Knew‟.

Speaking on the new role, Keazor said he decided to invest in Piql Africa because of the uniqueness and quality of its product and service specialisations as well as its strong global footprint.

“My career-long advocacy has been towards a more robust approach to information archiving and investing my expertise and resources with a global leader like Piql was a natural step. I sincerely look forward to being part of what shall certainly be an exciting and productive journey in the Nigerian data archiving space,” he said.

In addition, Nze Ed Keazor sees a future where in partnership with Piql AS Norway, he helps develop a series of programs to identify cases where African contributions made a significant impact and were recorded for the first time in diverse spaces and deposit the collections as African contributions to the Arctic World Archives, a safe repository for world memory designed to withstand man-made and natural disasters.

Vice Chancellor, of Admiralty University, Prof. Chima Korieh, who has spent many years working on endangered Archives Projects added that the addition to Piql Africa was a welcome and timely development, while Prof. Emeka Oguzie, Deputy Vice-Chancellor at the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, who heads the World Bank‟s African Centre of Excellence at the University, acknowledges that Nze Keazor‟s pedigree places him in the right position to lead the company and shape Piql Africa for years to come.