Mrs Yetunde Adekunle is the Pioneer and National president of The World Changers Youth Initiative, in this interview she says the only way Nigeria can achieve sustainable change is if the right values are been inculcated in the youth. She speaks with ABEEB ALAWIYE and COVENANT UMORU
What is the concept of The World Changers Youth Initiative all about and how did it start
The World Changers Youth Initiative (TWCI) is a group of youth from different sectors of the society coming together with the aim of influencing other youth towards a positive lifestyle. We have volunteers across Africa. Our areas of influence are political, Educational, media and entertainment, religious, business and economy sector.
The initiative started while I was on campus at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Ondo State. The initiative started with about twenty excellent students from a different department. It was more like a religious group but it is now open to all and sundry.
What are the yardsticks for becoming a member?
Every prospective member must be within the age of eighteen to forty-five because we believe anybody that has attained the age of eighteen should be able to decide for his or herself. Secondly, moral standard is also paramount because we only accommodate youth with good reputations, wherein the nearest future we will be bold enough to say this is one of our member representing the society. Against this backdrop, morality is one of the criteria for becoming a member.
How is the organisation funded?
Well, fund is the major challenge we are having; presently I and my husband who is the national vice president foot all the bills. However, we are soliciting for support from co-operation organisations and I believe in no distant time we will have sponsors.
How many programmes have you organised?
Since inception, we have staged a lot of seminar on media and entertainment, personal development, leadership development and entrepreneurship.
You said one of the goals of your organisation is to build a breed without greed can you emphasise on that?
We want to create sanity in the society because there is a lot of manipulation in every sector. If you take a look at our political system in Africa, corruption has eaten deep into the fabric of the system. Also, in the educational system, we had a lot of campaign of lecturer sleeping with students to give them a good grade, students offering money to the lecturer to influence their performance.
These are the breed with greed that is why we aim to build a breed without greed. Although we can’t change people because only God has the power to do that, we can only change the mindset and influence people.
Kindly give a hint into your forthcoming event tagged ‘LEADPRENEUER’
Leadpreneuer is a gathering of youth leaders in all sectors and it’s going to be a good programme coming up on May 29 this year. We are bringing up the likes of Oladipupo Clement who is a leader and investor. He will be speaking on corporate governance, national integrity for leaders and entrepreneurship. Similarly, Mrs Oladoyin Taiwo will be speaking on brand strategy. The program will host over one hundred young entrepreneurs and we hope to get a good response after the programme. Our target audience is for CEO’s, entrepreneurs and start ups, leaders of cooperate organizations.
What other organisation are you partnering?
We follow Young Africa Leaders Initiative (YALE) a Non-governmental Organisation established by former United State President, Barack Obama, and we hope to partner will more organisation in no distant time.
What are your forecasts for the future?
A dream is a dream, but when you put it into action it becomes a reality. Our biggest dream in the nearest future is to host African Youth Summit and we are also planning to hold massive empowerment program across Africa where we impact youth in our five areas of influence as expected. And I also foresee that in the nearest future, the government will partner with us to achieve a major goal, beckon to us to bring candidates and staff to represent the country. Our reputations and integrity will speak for us.
Is there any media platform set for this organisation?
Yes we have media platforms that interested people can reach out to and as a matter of fact we are still soliciting for help from the good citizens of Nigeria and other countries in Africa as a whole. We can be reach through the following social media handler;
Twitter@Changers_the
Facebook: The world changers youth initiative or @WeAreTWC
Email: theworldchangers05@gmail.com
You can also contact us on WhatsApp through this number 08063330156
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