By Dan Amor
Calabar, the Cross River State capital, was the centre of attraction Saturday July 15 as The Bridge Leadership Foundation held its seventh Career Day lecture. Committed to building generations of young people who are educated to become compassionate, entrepreneurial and actively engaged citizens who are empowered to take responsibility for their own lives and for making a difference in the world, the Founadtion is arguably the first of its kind in Nigeria.
In the past seven years, the Bridge Leadership Foundation has directly impacted over 25,000 young people through its unique programmes and the continued commitment of individuals, schools, corporate organizations, mentors, sponsors and partners who share its passion in raising generations of transformational leaders. It is said to be the biggest of such programmes in the South South geopolitical zone of the country.
From the testimonies of the beneficiaries of the Foundation, it has, in the past seven years impacted them with principles of personal and organisational leadership, which, when lived, unleashed human genius and inspired in them deep commitment and magnificent levels of service and satisfaction. According to them, the challenges and complexities they all face in their relationships, families, professional lives and communities are now of an entirely new order of magnitude. Established in 2011 by the immediate past governor of Cross River State, Senator Liyel Imoke, the Foundation, observers and analysts have said, clearly stands as the crowning achievement of Imoke’s life-time of service. The 2017 Career Day lecture paraded a galaxy of stars who did justice to this year’s Career Day theme, “Made in Nigeria: Local Production and Global Market.”
They included H. E Mr. Peter Obi, former Governor of Anambra state and Mr. Olusegun Awolowo, the Executive Director/CEO, Nigerian Export Promotion Council, as lead discussants, among other inspiring speakers. Governed by a board of seasoned professionals and run by a secretariat, its focus on excellence and global business outlook serves as a catalyst for further development within the local communities of the beneficiaries and the South South region.
In a blood-cuddling welcome address to the 3000-capacity audience in the magnificent International Convention Centre, cited by CNN as one of the three best architectural designs in Africa which was built by him during his administration as governor, Imoke maintained that he established the Foundation to raise future leaders who would excel in business, economy and governance and provide dependable leadership in the country. The former minister said that the Foundation provides a valuable platform for young people to be inspired by the success stories of youth in Africa, particularly in Nigeria, who are scaling the hurdles and challenges of growing up. Amidst a thunderous ovation, Imoke who became Nigeria’s youngest senator at just 30 in 1992, spoke glowingly of Mr. Peter Obi, the immediate past governor of Anambra State who was the lead discussant.
Obi who spoke on the theme, “Made in Nigeria: Local Production, Global Market”, proffered lasting solutions to the crisis bedeviling the Nigerian economy. He insisted that Nigeria is suffering from scarcity of leadership and integrity, stressing that most of the agitations springing up in Nigeria could be attributed to hunger and starvation which had in recent times gone beyond control as a result of the paucity of vision on the part of those holding the machinery of government. He cited Boko Haram in the North East, militancy in the Niger Delta, the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra in the South East, and farmers/herdsmen clashes as some of the challenges confronting Nigeria at the moment.
According him, Nigeria has the resources and potentials of becoming the greatest country in the world, but lacks visionary leaders. Today, we have different forms of agitations in the country because the people are poor and hungry. Nigerian leaders have lost touch with those they are leading. Speaker after speaker harped on the need for the country to invest in the youth, as capacity building organized for the youth was one of the ways to fight youth unemployment and avert restiveness.
As the theme of the lecture suggests, only massive local production of goods and a patriotic inclination towards the patronage of made in Nigeria goods can jumpstart the economy. For an incredibly lengthy period of Nigeria’s history, the nation has been aging without growing with quite a number of things put on hold.
Nigerian rulers have failed to tackle the menace of poverty and the increasing rate of ignorance in the land. What this portends is that the social contract principle has gone taut in Nigeria as most of our leaders have abdicated their responsibilities to the people. If past leaders such as Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Dr. Nnamndi Azikiwe, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, etcetera , achieved all they could when they were below 40, then the imperative of training and retraining the youth to take up the challenge of leadership in the country cannot be overemphasized.
Amor writes from Abuja