A Potted Biography of Denen Tofi: A Noble Entrepreneur in Tivland of Central Nigeria

Abstract

Scholars of various disciplinary orientations have engaged in research activities on issues concerning entrepreneurship. Their publications have proliferated with a view towards inducing the readers to understand the contributions of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship to economic life of societies, globally. In Nigeria and Benue State in particular, there is quite a substantial literature on entrepreneurship. However, all of these extant literature were written to the neglect of Denen Tofi, a noble Tiv entrepreneur that contributed so much in solving the challenges of human development in Tivland. Thus, this paper is an intervention to
study the contributions of Tofi to the development of entrepreneurship in Tivland in Central Nigeria. Its objective is to show how Tofi’s entrepreneurial activities created employment and paved the way to socio-economic development of the study area. The paper using extant and oral sources in line with interdisciplinary methodology evaluates Tofi’s attempts at surmounting the said challenges and analyses the number of issues that led to the collapse of his business enterprises. The study employs and applies the social cultural theory of entrepreneurship to the understanding of the phenomenon under investigation. The study concludes by recapitulating on the basic issues interrogated by the paper and emphasised that, the engagement and mismanagement of Tofi and Sons Group of Companies by his family members led to the collapse of his enterprises. In this wise, the paper proposes thoughtful policy prescriptions to tame the deteriorating state of the business ventures under review.