Basehitz Media

Earlier this week, renowned business man and philanthropist Eng. Ayotunde Akinola was decorated with an outstanding award of leadership excellence for his giant strides in youth empowerment.

The Ondo born business man who was represented by his aide, Mr. Vincent Osewa expressed gratitude for being considered with such an honourable award.

Here’s a quick recap of the event:

After all, protocols had been duly observed, Mr. Osewa Vincent Adeshina, the representative of Mr. Ayotunde Akinola Bally, started by introducing the topic for his Speech as:

“The best way to predict the future is to create it”- Abraham Lincoln.

The S.A to Mr. BALLY started with a congratulatory remark to all participants of the skills acquisition. He emphasized that the world needs people with skills acquisition to thrive and that skill is a great tool for financial independence.
According to him, “the Educational system in Nigeria is not qualitative enough to build potentialities because the system still follows the curriculum of past centuries which is not effective for the demands of the twenty-first century. We are in a dynamic world and our current challenges need more critical thinking and practical mental solutions rather than theoretical ideologies which are taught in our institutions that do not create solutions to our present predicaments in our present era. Currently, Nigeria has about a 2.9million citizens who are still battling with the issue of unemployment and about a 35million citizens who are employed but as shocking as it May sound, 28 million Nigerians are employed citizens who do not possess a degree certificate. This shows the retrogressive part of our education. Our system does not equip our youths with skills that are quite innovative. This is why we have so many half-baked graduates who cannot flourish in a competitive world. The last budget presented to the house by Muhammadu Buhari denotes the nonchalant attitude towards the educational system by our Leaders. A 6.7 percent of the budget was targeted towards education which clearly shows the worst budget to the sector in almost a decade now. How do we categorize that our leaders care about our future with such an attitude? Our system does not build the future for us and they do not want to also build us for the future. It then calls for personal development. As it is only humans with innovations that will be in control of the next generation. He also added that the Igbo apprenticeship system has created more employment in Nigeria than our Formal Education because the System is aimed at sustainable employment and financial independence.

Mr. Vincent also tabled the issue of Bad economy and mismanagement as the major problem Nigeria has been facing. He said, ‘Before 1999, about 40 Billion Naira was said to be lost annually as a result of public procurement’. for instance, At the beginning of the twenty-first century, 2001 to be precise, former President Olusegun Obasanjo started National poverty eradication program (Napep), the program was targeted towards the reduction of poverty in Nigeria. However, this program failed and brought about the National Economic Empowerment Development Strategies (NEEDS) in 2003 of which the program failed again. Conditional Cash transfers were also formulated to assist the indigent citizens of the country, the program was aimed at bringing an end to poverty by giving one million Nigerians #5000 each. As minute as the program may seem to be, it couldn’t sustain itself due to the high-handedness of those who are in charge of the disbursement of the funds and such money could not have taken anybody out of the shackles of poverty.

In 2011, the GoodLuck Ebele Jonathan-led Administration came with an idea to eradicate poverty in Nigeria by giving granted to medium-scale entrepreneurs. The program was tagged ‘Youths with innovation’ (YOUWIN) and was directed to helping innovative citizens of the country to boost their businesses. The program however lost its continuity.
In 2013, the GoodLuck Ebele Jonathan also came up with another poverty eradication idea that birthed *Sure-P* Subsidy Investment and Empowerment Program which also has gone to extinction today.
After some other references in the History of government reform strategies to tackle poverty in the economy, Mr. Osewa Vincent Adeshina pointed out the fact that the Nigeria government system does not possess a sustainable tool to single-handedly employ Her citizens, Hence stressing the need for more skillful Hands of the youth to provide the creation of wealth to resuscitate a more flourishing economy that will drastically reduce the rate of poverty in the Nation and also the need for support and mentorship from dignified Humanitarians like Mr. AYOTUNDE AKINOLA BALLY.

Following the fact that we live in a world driven by connection, Mr. Osewa Vincent Adeshina concluded his speech by beseeching the youths to
i.create enough relationship with people that are capable of aiding the actualization of their dream Knowing fully well that we all live in a world of the connected economy.
ii. Get adequate mentorship to gather more skills and finally equip ourselves with mental technological skills that can help us flourish well and survive.

He ended his speech by quoting the worlds of Alfred Knowles Whitehead who defined Education as the acquisition of the art of utilization of knowledge. He said that any educated person is not fully educated if he or she has not acquired the arts of impacting what he or she has learned. He concluded by imploring everyone to build more on their personal development as that is a key that can take us to the upper echelon of life.

At the end of the speech, he appreciated the bodies that organized the skill acquisition program and made all and sundry to be aware of the activities of The Movementng and the prospective partnerships the organization is working on which will is channeled to the building of more skillful youths with innovations. He also implored students of Adeyemi and everyone present to join the organization as we are open to more members from all parts of the world. With our collective hands, we will build the society of our dreams.