The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) has given $2 million to nearly 400 entrepreneurs in Rwanda as seed capital.

The global ambassadors praised the Foundation’s great impact in Rwanda and all 54 African countries.

The TEF is a famous charity founded by Mr. Tony O. Elumelu, a respected and influential business figure. The foundation operates with the primary objective of empowering and supporting African entrepreneurs in their journey towards success and economic development.

One of the key ways in which TEF achieves its mission is by providing seed capital to aspiring entrepreneurs. TEF provides money to help entrepreneurs start their businesses and make their creative ideas come true.

In addition to financial assistance, the foundation also offers mentorship programs to its beneficiaries. Through these programs, experienced and successful entrepreneurs provide guidance, advice, and support to the emerging business owners. This mentorship is important for entrepreneurs to overcome business challenges and complexities, improving their chances of long-term success.

TEF’s commitment to empowering African entrepreneurs extends beyond just financial support, mentorship, and training. The foundation also fosters a vibrant and dynamic community of entrepreneurs, facilitating networking opportunities and collaboration among its beneficiaries. This community-driven approach encourages knowledge sharing, idea exchange, and the formation of valuable partnerships, further enhancing the prospects of success for African entrepreneurs.

The foundation has given $2 million to nearly 400 entrepreneurs in Rwanda to help them start their businesses.

The foundation’s work extends beyond Rwanda and has had an extraordinary impact across all 54 African countries. The global ambassadors, including Amb. Cui Jian Chun, Chinese Ambassador to Nigeria, and Amb. Christophe Bazivamo, Rwandan Ambassador to Nigeria, have praised the foundation’s efforts and its contribution to entrepreneurship in Africa.

More pictures with the global Ambassadors below:

People often highlight the foundation’s initiatives with hashtags such as #EmpoweredByTEF and #TEF2024.

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Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen in Kingston, Jamaica.
Good evening to you all from Lagos, Nigeria.

Allow me to recognise my dear brother and friend The most Honourable Andrew Holness, Prime Minister of Jamaica.

Let me also recognise the other Prime Ministers of Caribbean states present here today
Our chief host and friend, Dr. Marlene Forrest-Street for organising this event which is the premiere investment and capital markets conference in the region.

I thank Dr. Forrest-Street for inviting me to speak at this event and for inviting me to Jamaica, a country I admire a lot and would like to visit.

I would like to begin by apologising for not being physically present with you all in Jamaica due to increasing health concerns caused by the pandemic and the increasing variants to the virus.

However, I have resolved to travel to Jamaica in Q1 2022 to physically visit the Prime Minister and you all to further explore ways in which we can further accelerate cooperation between Africa, the Caribbean, and the black diaspora. We share so much, in terms of history and opportunity!

Having travelled widely across the world, I know firsthand the importance of collaboration in trying to achieve goals and objectives

My name is Tony Elumelu, I am an African, born and bred.

I have worked in Africa all my life, invested in the continent and I have created businesses and institutions that have helped transform the lives of Africans and their communities.

Importance of Capital Markets

I have often said that the capital market is the engine of capitalism.

A well regulated, responsible capital market is of positive benefit to an economy. Properly run, it can democratise wealth and sustain growth.

Whilst acknowledging the role of the state to provide an enabling environment, as we all know now, private sector prosperity leads to wealth creation for all.

Wealth creation for social benefit for all.

In what I do, this is what I call Africapitalism.

Africapitalism positions the private sector, and most importantly entrepreneurs, as the catalyst for the social and economic development of the African continent. Business needs to do well and to do good.

This is why we must commend Dr. Forrest-Street and her team for the impressive work they have done in raising the profile of the Jamaican Stock Exchange.

They have helped over 80 companies raise capital through the Exchange and have a Stock Exchange valued at over USD16 billion.

They have helped develop entrepreneurs and their businesses.

I speak today as an entrepreneur that has benefitted from the capital markets, the Nigerian stock exchange to be precise.

• When we started, we needed money for our growth
• Money to prove our concept
• Short STB story on accessing the capital markets for growth

About Tony O. Elumelu (TOE)

Today, I sit as the Chairman of Heirs Holdings, my family-owned investment management firm that has interests in the financial services, power, oil & gas; real estate & hospitality; and of course healthcare.

We are long-term investors in the key strategic sectors of the African economy.

Our objective is to improve lives and transform Africa – to be role models, in business, in governance and in philanthropy.

The Financial Services Investments we have made is huge

• Chair the Group Board of the leading pan-African financial institution, the United Bank for Africa (UBA).
• UBA is present in 20 African countries, and in key financial centres of New York, Paris, London, Grand Cayman Island and most recently, Dubai.
• UBA is the only Africa bank with a deposit taking license in the USA – having scaled the most stringent regulatory requirements of the US financial services regulators.
• We have a customer base in excess of 25 million customers and counting across the world.
• We are not yet in the Caribbean, but this is something that we will explore when I come to Jamaica physically with the CEO of our UBA America’s operations.

Power, Oil & Gas Investments is another area of our interests.

Power, robust, plentiful and accessible is key to our economy. I invest in the sector for financial and social reasons. Our portfolio includes:

• Transcorp Power with 2 power plants with installed capacity to generate 2000 Megawatts of electricity.
• Heirs Oil and Gas; has significant interest in the oil sector, we produce over 50,000 barrels of oil daily and 2P reserves of 1.2 billion barrels of oil equivalent.
• Tenoil a further oil production business that is vastly rich in gas.

Our Healthcare Investments

• Avon HMO
• Avon Medical

Our Real Estate & Hospitality investments

• Transcorp Hotels Plc, for those who have been to Abuja, you probably stayed at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel during your stay.
• Afriland properties Plc, helps to anchor our end-to-end real estate development company.

In the beginning

When I started my own entrepreneurial journey long ago, the Nigerian banking system was not what it was today.

We had over 100 banks all fighting for supremacy in a regulatory environment that was not as capacitised as it is today.

I took a bank that was distressed and immediately set out 3 bold and audacious strategic intents in our turnaround strategy.

Our number 1 intent at the time was to become financially viable because we were a distressed bank.

Our number 2 intent was to become one of the top 10 banks in Nigeria, and we fixed timeframes to achieve this.

Number 3 – and then to become one of the top 3 banks in Nigeria.

These strategic intents helped to shape our activities and actions and accomplishments.

I dare say we were bold but disciplined.

We were laser focused on these intents and from time to time, we gathered to appraise our journey.

When you are small institution, there is a tendency to overlook things such as corporate governance as a fanciful thing reserved for large corporates but that is not true.

Often the foundations built at the early stages of a business determine the trajectory of that company and this is a message to all entrepreneurs.

Ensure you get your corporate governance right; it is most important to address these issues when you are small as opposed to when you are a larger organisation.

In due time we took the distressed bank and merged with a historically significant Nigeria bank to become todays UBA, a truly pan-African institution.

This was something that had never been done.

To turn around a financial institution in distress and then merge with a systemically important bank.

If we were not bold and audacious back then, I daresay, the Nigerian banking sector would look very different today.

Turning Point – Impact and TEF

Having achieved success in turning around a distressed financial institution into a systemically important Bank – And grown other businesses.

2010 became a turning point in my life.

I thought it was the time to think about impact, sustainability and legacy as well as improving lives and playing my own part in towards the transformation of Africa.

That is why, in 2010, I founded the Tony Elumelu Foundation, the leading philanthropy that empowers young African entrepreneurs from across the 54 countries on the African continent.

I ceded USD100m from my family wealth through Heirs Holdings to the Foundation.

In 2015, we began the Tony Elumelu Foundation Entrepreneurship Programme, an audacious 10-year programme to empower 1,000 young entrepreneurs annually from across the 54 countries in Africa.

Our TEF Entrepreneurship Programme beneficiaries receive:

• $5,000 non-refundable seed capital for their nascent business ideas. We need to encourage these young entrepreneurs who have outstanding business ideas but lack the financing to prove their concepts.
• Business training in the form of an intensive 12-week mini-MBA. MBA in a box we call it.
• Business mentoring from professionals and leaders across the globe.
• Learning first-hand from professionals and senior entrepreneurs is crucial for young business leaders.
• Especially when these mentors are invested in the success of the young ones they are mentoring.
• We create market access and foster linkages using our online proprietary digital entrepreneurship hub, TEFConnect.
• TEFConnect is the African entrepreneurship hub connecting over 1 million users with each other to trade and collaborate across borders.
• Indeed, our entire programme from application to training, mentoring and seed capital disbursement occur on TEFConnect.
• Please find time to check out the website TEFConnect.com to see the impressive work of the Foundation.

Through the programme we have supported over 15,000 African entrepreneurs to scale their businesses

We are incredibly proud of the programme, we have empowered entrepreneurs across multiple sectors, and are a truly sector agnostic programme.

We have young and vibrant entrepreneurs who operate in the fashion, healthcare, agriculture, education, power, and they all leverage technology to deliver services and transform their communities.

We understood the need for partnerships early on when we saw that hundreds of thousands of young Africans were applying for the Programme and our commitment was only 1000 entrepreneurs annually.

Such is the demand on the continent, there is no shortage of people with ideas, just a lack of capital willing to give them a chance.

Today through partnerships with global development organisations such as the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the European Union, the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS), and the African Development Bank, we have been able to increase the number of young entrepreneurs we support across the continent.

In November, for our 2021 cohort, we were proud to announce that 5,000 young African entrepreneurs were selected as beneficiaries to receive the non-refundable seed capital, mentorship, and business training of the Foundation.

We were equally pleased to see that 70% of those selected in 2021 were women driving gender inclusivity.

Our partners have seen the components of our holistic programme and decided to work with us towards a shared vision of a more prosperous Africa.

An Africa that is able to better utilise its resources for the benefit of the continent.

Our most important resource is our people so we must constantly encourage and support them . And this is true for Jamaica and the Caribbean.

This way, we reduce the vices associated with unemployment and large youth populations, e.g., terrorism, illegal migration, violence, and all forms of extremism.

Once we agree that these ills are caused by a lack of economic opportunity, the solution becomes clearer.

Empower youths and entrepreneurs and watch them create jobs and reduce poverty.

Conclusion – Building the link between Africa and the Caribbean

As an entrepreneur, wealth creation for me came from following my philosophy of Africapitalism ▪ We invested long-term in strategic sectors of the economy.

In essence we created wealth but also social good.

Africapitalism is all about doing good and doing well.

This is what we must preach across Africa and also in the Caribbean.

For too long we have failed to remember the teachings of great black men before us.

Men like Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican, and true pan-Africanist who preached unity between Africans and the African diaspora.

Pan-Africanists like Marcus Garvey understood the need for close ties between Africa and the diaspora.

That is not the case today, we need to re-forge these links stronger than they have been in the past.

We are in a digital age where we can easily achieve this through focused efforts.

We must not relent or give up.

We must continue to find ways to collaborate and strengthen opportunities for our people.

I call on the public sector to put this collaboration as a key action point from this great conference.

A key tenet of Africapitalism is the importance of the public sector in supporting the private sector’s efforts through the creation of the enabling environment that will support entrepreneurs and their businesses.

We must all ensure that the cultural linkages that connect Africa and the diaspora are strengthened not weakened.

In the words of Emperor Hailie Selassie said on his visit to Jamaica more than 50 years ago:

The people of African origin have immigrated to many parts of the world. Some of them have come to Jamaica, others to other parts of the world. But wherever they maybe they have similar historical experiences and the problems that await them depend on sympathy, and this can be used by all of us as the basis for the establishment of greater cooperation which will be for our mutual benefit.

Emperor Hailie Selassie

We have so much to learn from one another, our experiences and knowledge must be harnessed for the upliftment of Africa, the Caribbean, and the diaspora everywhere and anywhere ▪ To conclude, my message to the audience here is this.

We must foster collaboration among the African diaspora, no one will develop our communities but us.

I want to see close linkages between entrepreneurs in Africa and the Caribbean.

I offer myself as one of the private sector leaders of Africa-Caribbean in this pursuit. Brothers and sisters, let us join hands to create sustainable wealth and prosperity for all.

“The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.”

You know who said this, Jamaica’s very own Bob Marley.

As Marcus Garvey said: "The ends you serve that are selfish will take you no further than yourself but the ends you serve that are for all, in common, will take you into eternity"

Ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, I look forward to being in Jamaica in person!

Thank you

Tony O. Elumelu, CON
Chairman, United Bank for Africa (UBA)
Chairman. Heirs Holdings Limited
&
Founder, The Tony Elumelu Foundation

The post Tony Elumelu’s Remarks at the Jamaican Stock Exchange Annual Conference 2022 appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

• Good afternoon distinguished ladies and gentlemen.    
                  
• Let me commend the IOD President, Chairman of the organising committee and the team for organising this event and for the timeliness of the key theme

• We must all begin to think of giving back not necessarily in material form but at least in the form of knowledge and experience. If we have been on the corporate path and made mistakes, it would be bad of us to let those who come after us to make those mistakes.

• When I saw that this conference is about our younger ones inculcating this culture and discipline of corporate governance practices, I said I’ll do my best to speak to it.       
                         
• While reading the theme of the event, I immediately thought of the Tony Elumelu Foundation and over 15,000 young entrepreneurs from 54 African countries that we have empowered with non-refundable seed capital of $5000 each.     
  
• Last week Friday, we announced another cohort of 5,000 who will receive $24.75million.                                                      
• What came to my mind was the strategic importance of engaging our young ones at this stage so that together, we can help them to build institutions that will last and surpass the ones we have built.                                                                           
• When you think of IBM and Apple, you’ll find that while IBM was there before Apple, Apple is much stronger today.                    
• We want to see the businesses of our young ones – those who are here and those who are listening virtually – rise and overtake what we’ve already built.       
                                      
• When we talk of corporate governance, we speak about structures, policies, rules, and regulations that govern best practices. Governance is extremely important when you want to build to last                                                                      
• We have seen how a lack of corporate governance can destroy institutions. Poor monitoring, poor oversight, poor corporate culture, unethical business practices, lack of integrity at leadership level, all contribute to the discussion of companies and even the largest of institutions.       
                                                     
• Examples abound all over the world, including our country, of companies and businesses, that have not embraced strong corporate governance and standards.      
                                         
• When you hear that a large company has suddenly failed and is facing crisis, look closer. Most times, it’s corporate governance failure at play.      
                                                               
• So, to me, institutions that prioritise governance and the discipline to meticulously and rigorously stay on the path, always stay ahead of the curve and last.
  
• Our own story, as I believe some of you know, started way back 1997 at Standard Trust Bank here in Nigeria.                       
• We acquired a distressed bank, and we outlined the strategy we wanted to take while our board provided guidance and oversight.
                                                                                       
• Our number one intent at the time was to become financially viable because we were a distressed bank.                              
• Our number two intent was to become one of the top 10 banks in Nigeria, and we fixed timeframes to achieve this.                       
• Our number three intent was to become one of the top 3 banks in Nigeria.                                                                          
• This strategic intent helped to shape our activities and actions and accomplishments. I daresay we were disciplined, and laser focused on these intents and from time to time, we gathered to appraise our journey.                                                        
• The strategic intent on its own is just mere ideas and dreams but what helped us – I call it the most strategic foundation – was strict adherence to governance even though at the time we were very young, and they were calling us ‘cowboys’ who probably didn’t know what we were doing internally.      
                 
• But we had seen first-hand what the lack of governance can do to institutions we knew. So, to us, it was important that the basic foundation was strong adherence to governance principles.     
                                                                      
• And this governance is not rocket science. It’s more about discipline, what you put in place and how you go about it meticulously.                                                                       
  
• When you are a small institution, there’s a tendency to overlook corporate governance. You’ll just think, “Corporate governance is just for the big corporates and not for us.           
                    
• When we get there, we will talk about it.”  But if you don’t build that discipline from scratch, when you ‘get there’ you won’t have it.                                       
                                                  
• So, it is better as entrepreneurs or as new and upcoming directors, that we get it right from day one.                                    
•  It’s a journey, you don’t attain perfection on day one.           
              
• You’ll make mistakes along the way, realise those mistakes, and keep growing so that when your institutions get bigger, the principles, fundamentals, and philosophy are already ingrained in everything you do.                                                    
• I recall one of the first ‘tutorials’ I got at board level.

• I had attended a board meeting and my chairman then, Chief Ferdinand Alabraba said at the end of the meeting, “Let me advise you but I’ll put it in writing.” He wrote to me about board proceedings, how to sit, where the chairman sits, where the secretary sits, where the MD sits, how to prepare, etc.

•  I was surprised, I thought it was just to attend the meeting, talk and go. So, the learning started from there.                             
  
• Thinking about this session made me remember Chief Alabraba and I hope that most of you will remember the leadership of the IOD for creating this platform.         
                                      
• At times, we don’t know how important this is to us but in future we’ll see.      
                                                           
• If you look at company valuations, you will sometimes see that two companies have almost the same things but in terms of valuation, one is better because of some of these ingredients that are not immediately apparent.                                       
• They make a difference; they are not tangible assets, but they can be more strategic than the tangible ones. Governance is so critical.                                                
                               
• Most times, the foundations we build at the early stages of a business determine the trajectory of the business in the long run.

• For us then at Standard Trust Bank, it was crucial that we assembled a team of professionals that embodied the vision we had for the bank.

• We assembled a team that had a high level of dissatisfaction for the status-quo and who wanted to conquer the world.

• We institutionalised an environment with a culture of discipline. Everything that makes an organisation run in an optimum and professional way is all part of corporate governance.

• And I dare say that culture, discipline, sacrifice, professionalism, and integrity, are basic tenets of sound corporate governance.

• The institutionalisation of culture, work ethic and governance across organisations, lay the foundation for the expansion of a business ultimately.                 
                                                  
• In 2005, we orchestrated and had the Standard Trust Bank and UBA merger which remains the largest corporate combination in Sub-Saharan Africa’s financial services space.    
              
• We were much younger then and we knew were taking on a huge organisation so we reminded ourselves that this journey was so critical that it would further sharpen and improve our governance practices.                                                          
• And remember what I said before: corporate governance is a journey, so you’ll make mistakes, learn from them, make further determination not to and you keep improving.              
  
• Why do I talk about our beginnings? It is because each year, there are thousands of new CEOs and companies that are founded but do not have strong corporate governance because they do not understand the importance of strategic focus and direction, governance, and oversight.                
                  
• This is why we must engage these young businesses early on the importance of this.    
                                                   
• Building to last is a marathon and not a sprint. We need to let them know that they must not cut corners trying to make a profit. In the short-term, it may work but in the long-term its bound to cause monumental problems.                              
• We all share a common aspiration to see Nigeria and Africa develop. We want to create jobs in Nigeria and across Africa.   
  
• We want our young ones to not be misled into extremism because what creates extremism is economic hardship, poverty and above all, the fact that they don’t see a silver lining. No one who has economic hope or opportunities would be drawn to do certain things.                                                             
  
• So, if we realise that we need strong organisations and disciplined individuals, then it becomes a collective responsibility for us to commit to becoming an Alabraba for others.                                                                                                        
• We need to let our young ones know that they must not avoid governance.                                                                        
• For us, the philosophy of Africapitalism is about long-term commitment to development. I have seen first-hand how that helps a lot; it has helped me to, at times, just forget the immediate and look beyond.                                                    
• For our young entrepreneurs and CEOs, some of them founders of their companies, it is important that they set the tone of good governance from the top and from the start of operations.  
  
• Corporate governance is not a day’s job, leadership must walk the talk and show that it is important.                                            
• If leaders expect others to behave in a certain way but do things differently, it doesn’t work.                                                                            
• One of our businesses is Transcorp Hilton Hotel (the venue of this event) and each time I come here since we took over, I’ve always paid for my people’s accommodation here.                      
  
• So, when someone says he or she cannot pay, I find it difficult to justify because if I put myself through that, they should too.       
  
• It is crucial for the young companies to make objective decisions early on. By virtue of our upbringing in African communities, it’s easy for sentiments to creep into business.
  
• If during recruitment, people go through the same process, and you make a subjective or suboptimal decision so you don’t employ the right person because of family pressure or pressure from friends, you are eating away at fabric of the foundation of your business and with time, others will follow.       
              
• It’s not just the big things, the little things matter as well: the culture of excellence and meritocracy are values we should all imbibe, especially as we’re building new organisations.   
         
• Decisions such as who sits on the board, the composition and diversity of the board members and their different perspectives are fundamental to the long-term aspirations of these SMEs.
  
• I always advise young entrepreneurs to be very careful about who you bring to your board. At time some people want to have big names on their board, but big names sometimes cause big problems.                                                                     
• You need to ensure that your board selection and composition aligns with your medium to long-term vision.                              
• Forget big names, focus on the quality of decisions, knowledge and expertise of the people who will be on your board. Get the fundamentals right and business will come.               
               
• Have the right team, put the right culture in place, let people understand the destination, reward the right people, don’t reward people based on sentiment and make tough decisions when necessary.                                                                         
• In the long run, success will come and when success comes, the humility and the ability to manage success becomes another thing. Some people become successful, and it consumes them because they believe they can walk on water and that is when the problem starts.       
                                   
• We need the next generation of corporates to be strong in the fundamentals of corporate governance.                                 
• When an institution is big, corporate governance becomes even more crucial because you suddenly begin to realise that failure can become systemic. The kind of risks you could take when you were growing begin to be managed differently.                     
  
• In the United States of America, President Biden was going for a minor surgery for about 30 minutes, but he handed over power to his Vice President.       
                                          
• It seems simple but again, it is down to discipline and sound governance.       
                                                                  
• I want to share my story with you. When I was the CEO of UBA in 2010, the then Central Bank Governor came up with a policy that required any CEO that had spent 10 years in the role to step aside.                                                                             
• The next day, my chairman summoned an emergency board meeting, and their reaction was quite interesting. Everyone was against the policy and argued that the CBN cannot impose a tenure for CEOs.                                                                                                                                    
• They wanted to go to court. I was a lone voice at the meeting that day and I said no to our board members.                              
• I said there are five constituencies to look at.
  • One of them is the customer; would they stay with the bank when they hear we’re suing the central bank? No.
    
  • Secondly, we have the shareholders; they would likely dump their shares.
    
  • The third constituency is our staff; if they hear we’re in court with the CBN, they would start looking for jobs because they don’t know what would happen.
    
  • The fourth constituency is the regulator (CBN). Imagine the audacity to take your regulator to court. They would show you they’re the CBN and by the time they’re done, you may not even have a bank, not to mention being on a board. The four constituencies I’ve mentioned wouldn’t favour a lawsuit.
    
  • There’s one more constituency: Tony Elumelu. Would he like to continue? Yes, but that makes it four to one, so I appealed to the board to allow me step aside and we proceeded to appoint a new CEO within 24 hours. That’s corporate governance in practice.   
                                 
• Governance is not one person’s responsibility and most times, the biggest test of governance is when it affects you. The ability to step back, look at things holistically and subordinate self in the decision you make can be a game changer.  
        
• I thank God and our board that we made the decision for me to leave at the time because I would still be in that world. However, the world I live in now is more fun and active.
  
• Because of that, we started Heirs Holdings and the Tony Elumelu Foundation.                                                                    
• Heirs Holdings is a family-owned business that has interests in several sectors of the Nigerian and African economy, from financial services, energy, real estate, technology, hospitality to healthcare.                                                                            
• With a group as diverse as Heirs Holdings, we interact with different regulators as well as play in some of the most regulated countries in the world.                
                              
• UBA is the only African bank that is a deposit-taking bank in the United States of America and it is not easy to operate in that regulatory environment but we’re able to because we started gradually long ago.                                                         
• The journey to building a business to last on sound governance principles and practices is critical for sustained growth. To be continuously successful, is to be driven by core values, sound culture and practices, and corporate governance.                            
• In 2012, following the CBN’s policy that banks should divest their investments that were not core to banking, that was another test of our commitment to governance and professionalism.
  
• We transferred existing shares from UBA to become shareholders of those companies formerly owned by the bank.      
  
• So UBA Registrars became Africa Prudential, UBA Investment Bank became United Capital.                                                        
• We did this again because of our commitment to corporate governance and the need to make sure the businesses are run properly, and that people are not short-changed.   
                                                                           
• When you do things like this, they have telling implications in so many ways, especially among the staff within the business. 
  
• My message to our upcoming business leaders and even those who are already there, is that we need to realise that to be continuously successful is to be driven by core values, sound culture and practices, and sound, corporate governance.            
  
• Corporate governance is all-encompassing in scope and in the drivers.           
                                                                     
• It requires looking at the organisation from a 360-degree perspective: from the implementation of robust policies and procedures to hiring the right people with the relevant skills and competencies objectively, to implementing the right systems, doing things in a structured and predictable manner, and keeping records.                                                            
• Corporate governance has come a long way, thanks to efforts of industry regulators and bodies like the IOD for always pushing for higher standards.          
                                      
• But how do we imbibe the culture in our younger ones? We’ve made mistakes so we must strive, so they don’t repeat the ones we have made. Let it be that we have suffered for them so let them share from our stories.                                                            
• My suggestion to the IOD is that from time to time during your programmes, webinars and sessions, to invite a few people like we have done today to share their failures and what they could have done better. It would help those coming after us.          
      
• At the Tony Elumelu Foundation, part of the business training our entrepreneurs receive is on the importance of governance systems to the sustainable growth of their enterprises.    
           
• We believe that it’s not just about giving $5,000; what’s more important is preparing and capacitating you to manage that $5,000 when you get it.                   
                                           
• I believe there is a lack of understanding of what governance is and it is seen to be reserved for the public listed companies and large conglomerates, but we hope that is not the case.
  
• Continuous engagement and socialisation at forums such as this will help to inculcate the right spirit in these our young businesses as they attempt to scale.

• We need our own Steve Jobs, we need our own Apple, the first company to cost one trillion dollars in market capitalisation.

• We need our own Microsoft. We need to start building institutions to last. We need to build institutions that will not start with Tony and die with Tony.

• We need to have our own JP Morgan. To me, that should be our aspiration and the solution to that aspiration coming through is sound corporate governance.

• Let me conclude here and thank the IOD for organising this event and recognising the need to engage the younger generation of business leaders on this most fundamental issue

• Thank you.

Tony O. Elumelu, CON
Chairman,

• Heirs Holdings Limited
• United Bank for Africa (UBA)

         &
Founder, Tony Elumelu Foundation

The post Creating The Future: My Keynote Remarks At The 2021 Institute Of Directors (IOD) Annual Conference appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

The list is a part of AEC’s highly anticipated annual outlook tagged ‘The State of African Energy 2022’, a report which outlines Africa’s energy sector and provides insight into the various challenges and opportunities within the continent.

This recognition came following Mr. Elumelu’s action plan to increase the output of the OML 17 asset recently acquired through Heirs Holdings Oil and Gas – which currently produces 27,000 bopd. It is also owed to his control over the 2,000 MW of installed power capacity in Nigeria – via recent acquisitions, which is a major contribution to the country’s growing power demand.

Tony Elumelu is the Founder and Chairman of Heirs Holdings, his family-owned investment company, committed to improving lives and transforming Africa, through long-term investments in strategic sectors of the African economy, including financial services, hospitality, power, energy, technology, and healthcare. He is also the Chairman of pan-African financial services group, the United Bank for Africa (UBA), which operates in 20 countries in Africa, the United Kingdom, France, and is the only African bank with a commercial deposit taking licence in the United States. He also chairs Nigeria’s largest quoted conglomerate, Transcorp, whose subsidiaries include Transcorp Power, one of the leading generators of electricity in Nigeria and Transcorp Hotels Plc, Nigeria’s foremost hospitality brand.

The Tony Elumelu Foundation is the leading champion of entrepreneurship in Africa. Our objective is to empower women and men across our continent, catalysing economic growth, driving poverty eradication and ensuring job creation. We believe the private sector’s role is critical for Africa’s development and that the private sector must create both social and economic wealth.

Our mission is implemented through our programmes, research, communities, advocacy and convenings, including the annual TEF Forum, the largest gathering of entrepreneurs in Africa, and TEFConnect, Africa’s digital hub for entrepreneurs. The Foundation leverages its strong relationships in the public, private and development sectors to drive its mission of creating prosperity for all.

See the full list of Africa’s Energy Sector most influential individuals here.

The post Tony Elumelu Celebrated As Top 25 Influential Individuals In Africa’s Energy Sector appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

The initiative will fund 200 additional young African entrepreneurs complementing the US$100M Tony Elumelu Foundation Entrepreneurship Programme that has identified, trained, mentored and funded over 9,000 entrepreneurs from all 54 African countries since 2015. The partnership will also help to scale TEFConnect, the Foundation’s proprietary digital platform supporting African entrepreneurs and provide platform access to an additional 500,000 SMEs. The initiative is co-financed by DEG with 1.5 million Euro from the develoPPP Program funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

In alignment with TEF and DEG’s development policy, the partnership will create jobs and income, boost economic growth and generate local value in Africa. It will make important contributions to the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by providing funding, technical skills and comprehensive business readiness to drive better performance of SMEs in accordance with SDG 1 (No poverty), SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth) and SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure).

Entrepreneurs will be connected to networking support for further skills development, knowledge sharing and market linkages through a lifetime membership on TEFConnect. In addition, periodic impact assessment of up to 10,000 SMEs will be conducted through the partnership to inform policies and laws that will improve the environment for small enterprises in Africa, directly catalysing Africa’s economic growth and contributing to the continent’s prosperity and social development. 

Commenting on the partnership, the CEO, Tony Elumelu Foundation, Ifeyinwa Ugochukwu, stated, “In our continued quest to invest in African entrepreneurs, this partnership will fully capacitize young entrepreneurs to grow their businesses. DEG is a global player in fostering efforts in emerging markets and developing economies to generate employment, which is a mission we are dedicated to through entrepreneurship. African Entrepreneurs are the engines of growth, innovation and wealth creation in Africa, and there is no better time to invest in their development. The projected outcome of this partnership encompasses the entire entrepreneurial value chain and will create massive opportunity for entrepreneurs to build their ventures while equipping them with the skills to sustain business growth.”

Bernd Tilemann, Head of DEG’s West Africa office added that “DEG is delighted to start this cooperation and especially eager to support TEF’s digitalisation efforts and the drive for impact inclusion and its critical evaluation, which are topics that DEG is very passionate about. We believe these measures will form a great foundation to enable TEF to scale its efforts to boost entrepreneurship and small enterprise development in Nigeria and across the continent.”

The Tony Elumelu Foundation’s US$100 million Entrepreneurship Programme was launched in 2015 to empower 10,000 entrepreneurs over 10 years. Successful applicants receive world-class business training, mentorship, non-refundable seed capital of US$5,000, and global networking opportunities.  The Programme is open to entrepreneurs across all countries in Africa, both new start-ups and existing young businesses, operating in all major economic sectors.

The post TEF and DEG Partner to Empower 200 Additional Entrepreneurs Across Africa appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

Here are some impactful quotes from the conversation:

On Business:

• To a large extent, my mum played a role in shaping me. Even my colleagues wonder why one never gives up, why one is relentless. It is because of what I picked up from her.

• It will be useless of me to say I have money in my bank account if there’s poverty all around us.
  
• The ease of doing business must improve for the country to retain investment capital.
  
• Everything we do is all about impacting lives and transforming our society – it is all about leaving our society better than we met it.
  
• In 2010 when I left UBA as the CEO, I founded Heirs Holdings family investment company that invests in key sectors of the African economy. We basically are driven by our philosophy of Africapitalism – we want to see the private sector play its role in the economic development of our continent.
  
• We believe strongly that business leaders should be agile, and execute our strategy, only the paranoid survive.

• We need to make sure that we create the right environment that will enable people, businessmen, entrepreneurs to thrive and succeed.
  
• In business, in the private world, you need to make sure you bring consistency between the external and the internal world; you need to make sure your strategies have been executed as planned.
  
• I will say that we do have a crop of young, talented leaders and personally; I am impressed with the way they go about their work and accomplishing corporate objectives. We have the right pegs in the right holes.
  
• People are critical to any business, and if you understand that your human capital is critical, then their health and how they work becomes very important.
  
• The whole philosophy of Africapitalism is not to look up to the government alone so that we have the right environment for everyone.
  
• We need to be totally aware of the trend of people moving out of the country to invest in or locate in tangential, smaller economies.
  
• As it is with every enterprise, you have to think about the economy and be able to manage macro issues and socio-economic issues.

• In business, we are known as turnaround experts: we take businesses and transform them.
  
• In philanthropy, we are also trying to catalyse the creation of a new crop of African leaders.
  
• It’s all about transforming our society and making sure that we leave the society better than we left it.

• At UBA, we have a strong succession plan. The pipeline of succession is always there; you can always find 2-5 people that can step into the role at any time.
  
• Looking back today –  I planned to leave UBA at 50, but it happened at 47 – we have done quite a lot. It has always been about impacting humanity. It has always been about transforming everything we do.
  
• If we look at the area of healthcare, Dr. Elumelu, my wife, she runs our Avon Medical business and Simbo Ukiri runs the Avon HMO business. These are great leaders who help to make this entrepreneurship journey not as difficult as it would have been.

• In the area of healthcare, we are also doing quite a lot to help improve the human capital of the country, we have seen that health is wealth.
  
• We also believe hospitality is critical for attracting investment into our country and continent and hence the acquisition of Transcorp Hilton Hotel in Abuja. And today we are doing a lot.
  
• Investment and success in the private sector to a large extent is dependent on leadership surrounding itself with capable hands; hands that are more intelligent than leadership
  
• In our group, we have quite a lot, and it seems to people that it’s stressful, yes, it is tough, but I am blessed with capable hands. If you look at Transcorp, you have competent leadership, both the CEO of Transcorp, Owen Omogiafo, and the other CEOs that work with her, Dupe Olusola, Vincent who runs our power plant, Chris who runs our other power plant. These are very capable people, and they help to fire our growth.
  
• At Heirs Holdings, we have the guru himself, Emmanuel Nnorom, who is making sure daily that the engine is running. My job is more of thinking, sitting at board sessions with them and providing some level of strategic direction at that level but allowing them (the CEOs) to do what they know how to do.

On Power Sector:

• Access to electricity we believe is very critical for the economic upliftment of our people and critical for developing our country.
  
• For the power sector in Nigeria to work well – and it must work well if we are to drive this economy – we need to increase generation, make sure we fix gas supply to generating companies and make sure that the transmission lines are capacitised to evacuate the power.
  
• Investing in oil and gas for us as a group is not necessarily because of oil, it is more because of gas. We want to be able to assure and control our destiny. Gas from our oil &gas production will convert to electricity.
  
• We invest in power to catalyse the economic development of Africa.

• Through the Tony Elumelu Foundation, we support young entrepreneurs, and if you ask them what challenges they face in this country, they will tell you it is access to electricity. Any amount you give our entrepreneurs, some of them will not succeed because they spend so much on electricity.
  
• Access to electricity, we believe, is very critical for the economic upliftment of our people and critical for developing our country.
  
• We also decided to make sure that we have an integrated energy play, not just power, making sure that the gas field stock that makes the power plants operational is there. That is why we also invested in oil and gas just to make sure the ecosystem is complete, and we can actually help to power our country out of poverty and into economic prosperity.

• This country needs about 100,000MW of electricity a day to power the economy. Today, we operate with less than 5000MW. We must make sure that the powerlines are stabilised.
  
• Transmission is so critical for the survival of the power sector and for improving access to electricity. In fact, what some of us have advocated is that the entire power stakeholders should have a deal with the FG and take over the transmission lines. It is in our self-interest to make sure it works.
  

On philanthropy:

• The Tony Elumelu Foundation’s mission is to grant economic hope and prosperity to #AfricanEntrepreneurs. Job creation is very important for us to have peace.

• Some of us are where we are today because, at some point in our lives, someone gave us a helping hand to pull us up.
  
• I have seen first-hand, the poverty around us here in Africa. I was born and bred in Nigeria, I have seen both sides of the coin and I have worked and done business in Africa, and I have come to realise that the private sector does have a role to play in developing Africa.

• Through the intervention of the Tony Elumelu Foundation, we want to help encourage them to give them hope through the seed capital we provide, through the training we provide for them, and through the mentoring programme, so that they succeed and collectively all of us can fix the unemployment situation in Nigeria.

• The Tony Elumelu Foundation was set up to create more successful African business leaders. We want to create entrepreneurs who will feed themselves and support our overall economy.
  
• Global advocacy is that in the 21^st century, you must engage with Africa – not from outside, but from within and from the point of view of what we consider important. We appreciate aid but we know more importantly that we want to become “fishermen”.
  
• We all have a role to play in the development of our continent and we do so by investing in critical sectors of the African economy: infrastructure, power, railways.
  
• Investing long-term in critical sectors creates economic prosperity for you the investor and at the same time creates social wealth and prosperity and it becomes a win-win for everyone.

• Entrepreneurship has a key role to play in developing our continent.

• We are happy with what we are doing at the Tony Elumelu Foundation; happy to impact lives and transform our continent through the economic empowerment of our young ones.

On gender inclusion, diversity and equity

• Beyond education, empowering women is about making sure that at the table, everyone is there.

• The time has come to realise the immense potential of women. The time has come for us to realise the immense potential of women in shaping and making a good society.
  
• Women get things done – they are loyal, reliable and extremely committed.
  
• I am a direct beneficiary of the catalytic impact of women in moulding and shaping societies, and I want to continue to encourage that.

Watch the interview here: https://youtu.be/-R2Bgw8Ihmo

The post “Everything We Do is About Impacting Lives and Transforming our Society,” Tony Elumelu Says on AriseTV’s “The Morning Show” appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

Good morning All,

• The Primate of all Nigeria, His Grace, The Most Reverend Henry Ndukuba;

• The representative of the host Governor for the youth conference, Governor of Enugu State, His Excellency, Mr. Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi;

• The representative of the Governor of Delta State, His Excellency, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa;

• The Vice Chancellor of University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Professor Charles Arizechukwu Igwe;

• The eminent dignitaries from the Church of Nigeria gathered here today;

• And to the thousands of young ones gathered here at the University of Nsukka for the Joshua Generation International Youth Conference, all twenty-one thousand of you, I say well done for participating at this important event coming immediately after Easter.

• I must begin by thanking the Primate of all Nigeria, The Most Reverend Henry Ndukuba, for several reasons:

• First, for his organising this timely and important event, and for ensuring its great success. Looking at the crowd present here as I have been following the programme online.

• The youth are our greatest force on the African continent, and events like this that prioritise our youth must be commended.

• So thank you Big brother, thank you great man of God.

• I also thank the Primate for his warm invitation to me and indeed your consistency in following up with me to ensure that I deliver the opening keynote of this conference.

• Thank you also for the apt choice for the topic and theme of this event: ‘Africa: unlocking our potential, securing our future’.

• Let me introduce myself, I am Tony Elumelu, Chairman of United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc.

• UBA operates in 20 African countries and this is a wonderful opportunity to talk with the youth of Africa.

• In Nigeria, UBA operates close to 700 branches in every part of the country, we serve 25 million customers and most of them are young ones across Africa.

• Our young Africans are proud customers of UBA, they use our platforms, cards and digital bot Leo for their transactions.

• When I got this invitation, I thought what a wonderful way to speak to these young ones.

• I am also the Chairman of the Heirs Holdings Group. And most importantly to me, I am the Founder of the Tony Elumelu Foundation.

• And because of this session, I will speak briefly about what we do at the Foundation.

• The kind speaker that introduced me spoke about more people to signing up to the Foundation’s Entrepreneurship Programme on tefconnect.com.

• And I firmly believe that applying to the Tony Elumelu Foundation is one of the ways to be empowered as youth, and I want to encourage everyone here to apply.

• Take advantage, visit TEFConnect.com and be guided on how to apply.

• Apply for the non-refundable $5000, which is our own commitment to actually empowering young Africans which we believe at TEF at the future of the continent.

2. Context

• Let me therefore to set some useful context to guide our discussion today:

• Africa is the world’s youngest continent.

• Almost 60% of Africa’s population is under the age of 25.

• In Nigeria, youths of 35 years and under are estimated to constitute 70% of the population of the country.

• However, the jobless rate in Nigeria has now risen to about 30% in March 2021.

• Some states have as high as 56% of all their youth population as unemployed.

• In Africa, the situation is not much different:

• We have 65% of all Africans below the age of 35 and many of these people are not gainfully employed. 

• The Covid pandemic and resulting lockdowns have exposed the vulnerabilities in our population structure.

• We now have, as a continent, the largest young generation in history – this youthful population is Africa’s hope, it is our pride, and it is our potential.

• The urgency and need to unlock the potential of this generation is imperative for the security of our collective future.

• This is why I commend all of you and the Primate for choosing this topic.

• What should we do? How do we unlock the potential of African youth to catalyse the socio-economic development of the continent.

• Youth Restiveness is a ticking timebomb and we continue to face issues daily around:

• Extremism
  • Banditry
  • Robbery
  • Senseless killing
  • Kidnapping
  • Political thuggery, to mention just a few

• The question becomes: what are we doing to stem this?

• What are we doing to secure our own future?

• First, there must be a high sense of urgency.

• A dissatisfaction to what is happening, a commitment to improving things.

• We must accept that we face a crucial period in our history where youth issues must be the main and central issue of our time.

• Millions of our young people are entering the job market every year;

•  20 million jobs are needed to be created annually to absorb new entrants in the labour market.

• Only about 3 million formal jobs are being created annually across Africa and this was even before the outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic outbreak.

• The estimated annual growth of labour force is 5% whilst employment growth rate is less than 2% across Africa.

• There is huge and shocking deficit.

• How do we unlock the power of our youth? How do we harness their energy for good instead of wasting it?

The Power of Entrepreneurship

• For me and my colleagues at UBA, at TEF and the across the HH Group, we have come to believe that entrepreneurship-the power of entrepreneurship- is key to harnessing the potential of these young Africans.

• By so doing, we secure our own future.

• This comes from our own experience, first as entrepreneurs ourselves.

• And secondly as people that have committed a lot of resources at TEF (capital, time, personnel) in helping create a new generation of African entrepreneurs.

• We are helping to give economic hope and opportunities to young Africans.

• And we speak not just as people that do this in Nigeria but in all 54 African countries, the TEF intervention cuts across all sectors and gender across the 54 African countries.

• Because we believe that prosperity should be shared as much as possible across board and that poverty anywhere is a threat to us all everywhere

• We must prioritise our support for small-scale businesses given the enormous potential of our youth.

• Corporate organisations do well in employing people but there is a limit on how much corporates can do in employing the huge numbers of our unemployed youth.

• Therefore, capacitising and supporting small businesses, empowering our young ones and their businesses, in our own view is the most powerful means to reduce unemployment on the continent.

• It is the most impactful way to reduce the ills such as banditry, thuggery etc.

• Because people with economic hope, do not want to take the lives of others unnecessarily.

• People that have hope will preach peace and security.

• People that do not have economic hope, will begin to question the essence of their existence.

• We saw during the pandemic how young people showed us with their actions that yes, life is important, but livelihood is more important.

• This is why we must embrace entrepreneurship and work together to fix the issues we live with today.

• We need to improve access to electricity if we must empower our people.

• I also wear another hat as the Chairman of Transcorp Group and as the last speaker said, we have invested massively in the power sector in Nigeria.

• Collectively over $1bn has been invested in the power sector because of our belief that the economic transformation of Nigeria and Africa will rest on the availability of power.

• We cannot have our SMEs spend their profits on buying power for their businesses, we need large scale infrastructural support to provide sustainable and constant power for our people.

• One of the major complaints we get from our TEF entrepreneurs is about a lack of access to electricity and how it takes a lot of their capital.

• We cannot make progress, if we do not fix power.

• Let us provide electricity for our young ones and they will do great things before our very eyes.

• We need to create hubs and zones in every LGA starting from Nigeria to be able to empower our young ones.

• If the government, and when we say government here, we refer to the LGA, were to create small business hubs where people can go in with their ideas and have a platform to convert their ideas to real life, it can make the difference.

• We need tax friendly policies that encourage our entrepreneurs, we need to reduce taxes for SMEs, and one must commend the Federal government, it has done good work in this area in terms of tax waivers for Micro-businesses, but still, much more is required but good work has been done and the government should be commended.

• We must create access to, access to finance is crucial, young people have the ideas, what they lack is the training and financing needed for their businesses to take off.

• At the TEF, we provide non-refundable seed capital, but that alone is not an end.

• We have long realised that for you all to succeed, mentoring and business education is required. And this is why we have the 12-week training programme and I want you all to take advantage of this.

• Go to TEFConnect.com to sign up so you are trained, the knowledge you get from there will help you in becoming entrepreneurs and for those that are entrepreneurs already, the training will help scale your business to the next level.

• We must create economic ecosystems and platforms to support small businesses.

• There are government policies needed for our young ones to prosper:

• Low tax rate regimes,
  • training,
  • and mentoring support to entrepreneurs.

• It is a source of pride to my colleagues and I that entrepreneurship is one way to realise the potential of young Africans.

• We must create the right environment; we must commend the Primate for the foresight and ingenuity in the framing of this conference the way he and his colleagues have done.

• The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) which my family and I founded in 2010 is the leading African philanthropy empowering young African entrepreneurs. TEF is empowering a new generation of African entrepreneurs, catalysing economic growth, driving poverty eradication, and driving job creation across all 54 African countries.

• Since inception, the Foundation has funded about 10,000 young men and women and created a digital ecosystem of over one million Africans, as part of our ten year, US$100m commitment through our TEF Entrepreneurship Programme.

• You can and must apply today at tefconnect.com to access this life transforming opportunity.

• The $5000 non-refundable seed capital, the business training and mentoring is part of our holistic approach to build the long-term capacity of our young ones.

• The importance of the training is vital as young entrepreneurs need to know the principles of business in order to scale their enterprises and increase the impact felt in their communities.

• So that when success eventually comes, and it will come, you will know how to manage success and not let success manage you.

• We need more functional and Vocational Training programmes as the second way of making Africa realise the full potential of our young ones.

• We need more vocational training programmes, we are not just being prescriptive, I spent a bit of time explaining wat TEF does so the opportunity is available to all 21,000 here and also those of you watching.

• We want to catalyse other endowed Africans to look into the area of entrepreneurship, we all have a role to play in making a difference in Africa.

• Some labour is imported in Africa, doing things that we can have Africans do. By getting them employed, we are giving them a sense of self-dignity as they work and earn a living and by so doing, improving their families, the communities and contributing in their own way to the economic prosperity of the continent.
• I daresay that our young people want to be counted, they want to be part of the solution.

• Let us help created functional and vocational training programmes.

A third solution is the Moral Rejuvenation and reorientation of our young ones:

• We need our young ones to embrace hard work, be disciplined, to believe that success comes from commitment, hard work and making sacrifices.

• My late dad told me that if you earn 1 naira and you don’t save, if you earn 1 billion naira, you still will not save!

• We need to change the way our young ones see life.

• We need to give them economic hope, they need to know that you don’t have to turn commit fraud to succeed.

• We need to have our:

• Our Religious leaders,

• Community leaders

• Teachers,

• Lecturers,

• Traditional Leaders,

• Governments,

• Role models and mentors lead this crusade of changing the mindset of our young ones.

• They must know that the key to success is hard work, commitment, and being laser focused on what you consider important.

• Our young ones must learn about perseverance, patience and must think long-term, they must know that quick gains/wins can create more problems later on in life.

• I believe that a combination of some of this,

• The right moral foundation

• A reorientation of our value system

• Training and adjusting our education system to be more functional

• Above all, all the things earlier mentioned on entrepreneurship

• If these are well planned and sequenced, it can help to a large extent to change the future trajectory of our continent.

• Across board, we need to have a moral rejuvenation of our people.

• This cuts across all segments, spheres, and demographics of our society.

• All concerned stakeholders must come together to play their role and ensure this collective reorientation.

Conclusion

• In conclusion, I would like to reiterate my message:

• When do we nurture and prioritise our youth?

• The answer is now, there is no better time than now to bring our youth to the forefront

• Any further delays will be extremely catastrophic

• We cannot afford to waste the demographic dividend especially as we have millions of youth entering the job-market place yearly

• How do we nurture them?
  • The answer is entrepreneurship, functional and vocational training and moral rejuvenation/moral re-armament and a shift in our value orientation.

• Who will nurture, support and guide our youth?

• The answer is all of us working together for their greater good.

• The future of our Africa, as I say always, truly lies in the hands of these young ones but we all have a responsibility in making this happen.

• Thank you.

Tony O. Elumelu, CON
Chairman, Heirs Holdings
Chairman, United Bank for Africa (UBA)
Founder, Tony Elumelu Foundation

The post Tony O. Elumelu: Youth Restiveness Ticking Time Bomb for Nigeria, Others appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

The event, which was organised by the Church of Nigerian (Anglican Church) and the Primate, The Most Rev’d Henry Ndukuba, The Archbishop, Metropolitan & Primate of All Nigeria sought to proffer solutions to advancing the state of African youths.

During the conference, Tony Elumelu emphasized the importance of youth empowerment and the role entrepreneurship and the private sector has in delivering a better future for Africa. He reflected deeply on the situation on the continent, calling to action young Africans to socio-economically transform the continent.

“We have 65% of all Africans below the age of 35 and many of these people are not gainfully employed.  The Covid pandemic and resulting lockdowns have exposed the vulnerabilities in our population structure. We now have, as a continent, the largest young generation in history – this youthful population is Africa’s hope, it is our pride and it is our potential. The urgency and need to unlock the potential of this generation is imperative for the security of our collective future.”

He highlighted how the Tony Elumelu Foundation invests in structures, resources and platforms that empower entrepreneurs and enable them build businesses that are sustainable and add economic value to their communities.

“We are helping to give economic hope and opportunities to young Africans. And we speak not just as people that do this in Nigeria but in all 54 African countries, the TEF intervention cuts across all sectors and gender across the 54 African countries because we believe that prosperity should be shared as much as possible across board and that poverty anywhere is a threat to us all everywhere.”

On the essentials needed to improve the performance of SMEs in order to reduce unemployment on the continent, he identified the following:

Constant power supply: “We cannot have our SMEs spend their profits on buying power for their businesses, we need large scale infrastructural support to provide sustainable and constant power for our people. One of the major complaints we get from our TEF entrepreneurs is about a lack of access to electricity and how it takes a lot of their capital.

Tax friendly policies: “We need tax friendly policies that encourage our entrepreneurs, we need to reduce taxes for SMEs, and one must commend the Federal government, it has done good work in this area in terms of tax waivers for Micro-businesses, but still, much more is required.”

Access to finance: “We must access to finance; this is crucial, as young people have the ideas, what they lack is the training and financing needed for their businesses to take off. At the Tony Elumelu Foundation, we provide non-refundable seed capital for entrepreneurs.”

Employ more Africans: “Some labor is imported in Africa, doing things that we can have Africans do. By getting them employed, we are giving them a sense of self-dignity as they work and earn a living and by so doing, improving their families, the communities and contributing in their own way to the economic prosperity of the continent. I daresay that our young people want to be counted, they want to be part of the solution.”

Moral Rejuvenation and reorientation of young ones in Africa: “We need our young ones to embrace hard work, be disciplined, to believe that success comes from commitment, hard work and making sacrifices. Our young ones must learn about perseverance, patience and must think long-term, they must know that quick gains/wins can create more problems later in life.”

He concluded with an urgent call to action for all relevant stakeholders to combine forces towards the advancement of youth for the future trajectory of Africa, “The answer is now, there is not better time than now to bring our youth to the forefront. Any further delays will be extremely catastrophic. We cannot afford to waste the demographic dividend especially as we have millions of youth entering the job-market place yearly. The answer is entrepreneurship, functional and vocational training and moral rejuvenation/moral re-armament and a shift in our value orientation. The answer is all of us working together for their greater good.”

The 2021 Tony Elumelu Foundation Entrepreneurship Programme runs on www.tefconnect.com.

The post Tony Elumelu delivers poignant Keynote speech on Youth Empowerment at the Joshua International Youth Conference appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

Here are 10 fun facts we learned from our #TEFLiveSeries!

On the last book he read:  There was a time in his career he used to read voraciously. But increasingly, with the weight of his responsibilities as the chairman of Heirs Holdings and United Bank for Africa, his reading habits have been altered. However, he is re-reading “The Prince” by Nicolo Machiavelli, reminding us all that reading is important and that re-reading a book is so much more fun.

On whether red is his favourite colour: Interestingly, red is not his favourite colour. Whenever he socialized during the pre-covid era, he leaned towards black ensembles. However, the reason red is the corporate colour for the Heirs Holding group is because it depicts warmth, friendship, freshness, fertility, and strength.

On how many red ties does he own:  As expected, he does not know exactly how many it is, but he (and so do we) know that it is a lot. He often tells himself, “okay, no more red ties”, but then enters a store and sees another red tie and then starts a new journey with it.

On his favourite sports team:  Although he has a tennis court at his residence, he cannot quite remember when he last played a game of tennis. However, he loves lawn tennis and football and even served as a goalie in in primary school!

On how many minutes he can plank for:  His new planking routine is to strengthen his upper body core. He can do a 2-minute straight plank, and then 30 seconds on each side. He tries to do 5 minutes in total and confesses that the toughest part of planking is the first 2 minutes.  

On what age he started his first business:  One of the most poignant things he said was that the route that one takes to setting up a business is more important than the age they were. For some, this route could emerge from as young as when they were in primary school, or secondary school, or even college or university. For him, it was in his university era. He emphasized the importance of being present and pursuing whatever it is one is passionate about, in order to identify the right time to pursue that path. It is not mathematical or mechanical that you start at 20, or 30, or 40, but to strategically pursue that which you are passionate about. 

On why he is called Lion King: There are many reasons he is called the Lion King. The lion is agile. The lion is a big animal, but extremely fast, especially when he is running to feed. A lion also moves strategically, while also knowing how to take care of his cubs. A lion knows when to strike at the right time, and that is what makes the lion the king of the jungle. 

On how he ensures a good work-life balance:  It is about “the genius of and”, a life hack he once read in a book. For him, it is about making sure work does not suffer and at the same time, your wellbeing as an individual, as a family man, and as a member of society is continually sustained. It is the realization that if you are not healthy and mentally balanced, you cannot be a productive member of the society. If there is harmony across board, you will be able to work better.  

On if he has mentors:  He does have mentors, role models, and people who have influenced him greatly. His biggest mentor is Ebitimi Banigo, who gave him a career opportunity and changed his life. However, he has other people who have also influenced him, including Michael Jackson, who was a perfectionist. He loves how disciplined and dedicated Michael Jackson was to his craft. Another musical artiste he admires is Bob Marley. He flew to Jamaica two years ago with a single mission to step on the soil/and enter the house of Bob Marley. He is also influenced by Steve Jobs for his great mind and endless ideas. He is influenced by people who, despite challenges, make a difference and leave lasting legacies.

On his love of corn:  When it comes to eating corn, he keeps it simple: boiled with a pinch of salt. Sometimes he pairs it with coconut. But he has not eaten corn in a couple of months, and he is beyond thrilled as the corn season approaches. 

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If you missed our #TEFLiveSeries chat with T.O.E, be sure to check out the full video on our YouTube page HERE. 

The post 10 Fun Facts We Learned about our Founder, Tony O. Elumelu, during the #TEFLiveSeries! appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.

Many strategies have been employed towards bridging the inequality gap such as in Lesotho where it was noticed that increases in formal wages among the poor, expansion of primary schooling, and favourable demographic changes all contributed to lowering inequality. The study by the world bank found that that the biggest reason for the decline has to do with introduction and expansion of social protection programs.

At the 2021 World Government Summit, leaders across the world discussed the rising challenges, economy, geopolitics and governance post-pandemic, and the need for governmental process and policies for “Africa’s Future Post 2021”.

When asked about what new billionaires will be coming up in Africa, Founder of the Tony Elumelu Foundation, Tony Elumelu, had indicated the need to move away from the curation of billionaire lists and instead focus on the impact and efforts that billionaires make to improve the lives of those around them in their countries and the continent.

“We should be talking of how many young Africans we are going to impact in 5- or 10-years’ time rather than the number of billionaires we have,” he said.

“Instead of having a pyramid of billionaires, I prefer we have a large base that has prosperity for all, happier people and people whose basic human needs are met. I think that’s what is going to give us the sustainability and the lasting peace we need in Africa.”

Mr Tony has often spoken about entrepreneurship and support for small and medium scale enterprises as one of the ways we can address poverty in a fundamental and sustainable way and the need for business leaders in Africa to show confidence in the African continent by investing on the continent, attracting investors to the continent and through this process, inevitably create jobs.

One of the common factors cited for investing in Africa is “too much risk” however, these investment options are not without attractive risk-adjusted returns which are often had from Africa’s burgeoning population.

What Africa needs is a long-term approach towards the people and partnerships that are beneficial to all parties involved. The recent milestone by fintech platform, Flutterwave’s integration with Paypal, which now allows African businesses receive payments from across the world presents one example of how the growth opportunity presented by the continent is fast being recognised.

For a more prosperous, equal Africa built for the many, not the few, investing in its young entrepreneurs and providing social safety nets enabling them to build and take off from the ground is essential to a sustainable approach to development on the continent.

The post A Sustainable Approach to Making Impact in Africa appeared first on The Tony Elumelu Foundation.