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A group of young leaders under the aegis of the Mandela Washington Fellowship Alumni Association of Nigeria, backed by the United States government, has embarked on the training of youths and teenagers across Nigeria. The aim is to prepare them for leadership in business, academics, politics, entrepreneuship and all other spheres of life.
The group is made up of Nigerian youths who have undergone leadership training programmes in the United States of America, under the Mandela Washington Fellowship programmes.
Over 150 youths were trained in Ibadan on Saturday at an event organised at and with the support of the Ibadan School of Governance and Public Policy (ISGPP).
Speaking to journalists at the sidelines of the event tagged The Impact Project (TIP), President of MWFAAN, Dr. Fatudimu Segun said that the group’s major objective is to come up with a youth-led vision and agenda for Nigeria.
“We want to inspire them to develop and run their own businesses and organisations and take up leadership positions in various segments of the society” he said.
He disclosed that the plan of the association is to train at least 100 youths per city across 14 states in Nigeria. He listed some of the states being targetted as Oyo, Sokoto, Gombe, Kaduna, Imo and several others.
On what next for the participants after the training, Fatudimu said the association would follow them up by attaching some of them to other Mandela Washington Fellows(MWF) in Nigeria for mentorship while others would get opportunities to work as interns at ISGPP.
Apart from Fatudimu, other MWF who served as resource person at the training include Timi Olagunju, a tech lawyer and House of Reps aspirant in the 2019 elections; Edem Dorothy Ossai, Founder and Executive Director MAYEIN; Dayo Adeniyi (Dayo Nigeria), Founder of Matador Leadership Institute; Adepeju Jaiyeoba, Founder Mother’s Delivery Kit.
The training covered various leadership concepts and elements including leadership preparadness, volunteering, comminity outreach, gender parity and equality and several others.
Speaking later to Newspeakonline, Olagunju stated that his aspiration for the House of Representatives is based on the need to give youths a voice and push for the restructuring of Nigeria in order to have a country conducive for everyone especially the youths, the elderly, the vukberable and persons living with disabilities. He said that the Not Too Young To Run movement has now shifted to The Ready To Run Movement.