The Arole Odua, Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi has launched a pet project, the Royal African Foundation.
The youth inclined foundation is targeted at addressing a wide range of issues affecting youths, including leadership, poverty, social inclusion, inequality, among others.
The launch of the foundation coincided with the sixth anniversary of the Ooni on the throne of his ancestors.
According to the monarch, the foundation is part of his contribution to give youths a viable platform to explore their talents and synergize to begin to drive the much-needed development in society.
“This event is another red-letter day for me because this is an initiative that I am very passionate about. The Royal African Foundation is deeply rooted in five pillars which are the bedrock of my existence on this throne and that’s what I stand for.
“We have a lot of youths that are out there that can perform wonders, they only need good self-esteem to get a lot of things done.
“They are called leaders of tomorrow, but I don’t belong to that school of thought anymore, they are right now the current leadership structure particularly in the area of governance and politics. We need to instill a lot of discipline and moral values in them, the content of their character is very paramount.”
While responding, the President of the Royal African Foundation, Mr. Olusola Owonikoko, said the initiative will require mobilizing financial, human, and technological resources to directly address poverty, inequality, and social exclusion through pragmatic intervention from the grassroots to the national level.
Owonikoko maintained that the foundation will focus on five pillars including Leadership and Governance; Technology and Innovation; Creative Culture, Academic Excellence.
He added that the Foundation will serve as the Umbrella body for all transformational humanitarian projects of the Ooni of Ife.
“No one person will be able to change Nigeria at once, we all have to come together and collaborate. But we don’t have such a prestigious platform that aids collaboration and that is what the Foundation is already doing; bringing people together to create sustainable impacts,” Owonikoko explained.
