President Bola Tinubu has challenged Africans, including its political and business leaders, to look inwards instead of undue reliance on international donor funds.
He made the call yesterday at the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) and United Nations Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) Generation Unlimited (GENU) Breakfast Roundtable meeting, a side event at the ongoing 78th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.
The event also served as launch of the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) Impact Report titled ‘The Tony Elumelu Foundation Entrepreneurship Programme: A Decade of Impact.’
The president, who was represented by the Minister for Trade and Industry, Doris Uzoka-Anite, decried the over reliance by Africans on foreign donors, calling for an end to that mindset. She also stressed on the need for local solutions to economic growth and unemployment, while offering incentives to willing investors.
She said: “I don’t think we are doing enough as Africans for Africa. We need to do a lot more. Elumelu has been the major person driving investments in supporting the youths and start-ups.
“We need to take up the challenge upon ourselves as Africans to support one another. It is about time we stopped looking for international organisations for donor funding. We need to go out of that mentality.”
On the importance of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), the president said they were the engines of Nigerian and African economic growth, adding that they contributed almost half of national GDP, and more than 80 per cent of employment.
President Tinubu and Tony Elumelu
In his speech, Elumelu said the event highlights the significant contribution of TEF’s flagship $100 million Entrepreneurship Programme in advancing Africa’s socio-economic development. He noted that 13 years ago, the foundation took a bold step to rewrite and change Africa by enhancing entrepreneurship development to galvanise African solutions.
Stressing on the seed capital, training and mentoring and networking provided by TEF, he added “we have lit a beacon, and we need the beacon to shine brighter. To do this, we need the support and collaboration of everyone.
“$100 million is a drop of water in the ocean compared to what we need in Africa. Young Africans need economic support. We’ve seen the devastating effect of climate change, how our young ones due to hopelessness are migrating and living in difficult situations. We want to put a stop to that.”
To achieve that, Elumelu called for collaboration to prioritise young Africans, bring more women to economic activities and alleviate poverty, adding that “poverty anywhere is a threat to all of us everywhere”.
Sharing the Lagos experience at the gathering, Lagos State governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, said TEF’s work aligns with Lagos programmes on economic empowerment and poverty reduction.
Sanwo-Olu said that collaborative efforts must be evolved to enhance the scale of impact to deepen inclusion, equity and fairness.
Also speaking, Ahunna Eziakonwa, Assistant Administrator and Regional Director for Africa (UNDP) said they partnered TEF due to similar belief in galvanising development across Africa and globally, adding that Africa’s wealth was its population, which constitutes 70 per cent of young, vibrant and innovative Africans.
“It is our loss if we don’t invest in them because that is the future of prosperity,” she said, just as she called for enhanced collaboration and investment to strengthen economic development of African youths.
Earlier on, TEF Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Somachi Chris-Asoluka, said the organisation is the partner of choice for all development agencies across the world who want to transform the way they give to Africa, who want to have a more catalytic, impactful partnership with the African continent.
She said: “The Tony Elumelu foundation is a leading philanthropy in Africa empowering young African entrepreneurs from all 54 African countries.
“We launched our flagship program, the Tony Elumelu foundation Entrepreneurship programme in 2015 with a $100 million commitment by Mr Elumelu and his family.
“His goal was to see 10,000 African entrepreneurs over 10 years, in only eight years, we have more than surpassed that target so date.
“We have funded 18,000 entrepreneurs, disbursing over a 100 million dollars directly as seed capital to these entrepreneurs and they have gone on to create over 400 thousand jobs across all African countries.”