By Nkasiobi Oluikpe Correspondent, Lagos
Worried at the status of reading culture and rate of failure of younger ones during examinations, a group of eminent Nigerians, under the auspices of Ignite African Leadership Foundation, have staged a ‘Walk’ to raise awareness and revive the reading culture among the populace.
The project tagged ‘Destiny Walk’ is spearheaded by Kola Oyeyemi, general manager, consumer marketing, MTN and founder/convener of Ignite African Leadership Foundation with quite a number of other socialites and technocrats from different sectors including education, banking and entertaining. Slated for July 12, the group would take off from Rowe Park, Yaba, Lagos.
Ignite African Leadership is a foundation targeted at raising a new generation of Nigerians, teaching them the values and virtues of hard work. Speaking on the motivation behind the ‘Destiny Walk’, Oyeyemi lamented that the last five years have seen a very disturbing statistic, saying, Nigerians talk more on failure rates which he claimed is as high as 80 per cent.
“That tells you that our leadership potential as a nation has reduced to about 80 per cent. If 80 per cent of our young people are failing exams, the question is why. It is not because they are not intelligent. Once upon a time we were a nation where people come from outside to hire our own people, now we are the ones going outside to hire people to do the jobs that Nigerians are supposed to do.
“For middle management jobs we will go to hire Indians, for low level jobs. We will go to Cotonou, so what happens to the exploding population of Nigerians.
“We are growing at a fast rate and not developing. If we keep quiet and do nothing about this, we will soon be having a population of illiterates who will turn against government, turn against themselves and the whole country will be in flames.
“So we are saying let us revive this reading culture, get young people to read again, not just read, but read the right books that would expand their minds and horizon and build up to the leaders that this nation deserves so as to be amongst the committee of nations.
“What we are saying is read the right stuff so that we can grow with the mindset of a leader,” he said.
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