“There's a Gap”: Stakeholders Suggest Solution to Leadership Problem in Nigeria
- Nigeria has been advised to dissipate more efforts and resources in the training of young people to address the leadership gap in the country
- Stakeholders gave the urge at a leadership conference organised for students by iLead, a leadership initiative by Maxwell Leadership Foundation
- The development comes against the backdrop of challenges confronting Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation
Stakeholders have called on the government and relevant institutions in Nigeria to embrace the training of students in leadership as an integral approach to nation-building.
They spoke at a leadership conference for students and official launch of iLead, an initiative of Maxwell Leadership Foundation, in Nigeria, on Friday, June 21, 2024.
The conference, tagged ‘I Can Lead’, held in Lagos state and was targeted at encouraging young students to position themselves rightly for leadership by imbibing the right values.
Source: Original
‘There is leadership gap globally’
Bad leadership is often considered as one of the major challenges limiting Nigeria's growth, despite its huge mineral and human resources.
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Commenting on this at the event, Gbenga Samuel, the iLead Director in Nigeria, stated that the world cannot make progress without being deliberate about training young people in leadership.
He said:
“We all know that globally there is a leadership gap and people expect to see great leaders, but there is no intentionality in teaching people how to become leaders. We teach students to know Maths and English, but we don’t intentionally teach them what they need to know to become great leaders, that's the gap that we see, its the gap of values and we want to help the students embrace the right values.”
Samuel said as an organisation, iLead is targeting training of one million Nigerian secondary students across the country within the next three years.
“We are focused on helping students embrace the right values. Values like attitude, commitment, making the right choices, self discipline, forgiveness. I believe that if they have the right foundation laid on good values they'll become better leaders tomorrow.
“I believe that the students are being given a unique opportunity to start their journey of leadership on the right foundation. I want to encourage students and schools to embrace this opportunity, to embrace iLead programme. In today's event we have over 20 schools represented. In terms of the pilot that we did in the last one year, we have ten schools that participated.
“We started the pilot in Lagos but the plan is to expand to other states across the country. Next academic session starting in September, we are reaching 30,000 students, so we are expanding to other regions."
Some stakeholders at the event include Abolaji Abayomi, the permanent secretary, ministry of basic and secondary education in Lagos state; and Asaolu Oluwafemi, the director, ministry of basic and secondary education in Lagos, who were both represented by Adeoye Olamilekan.
Others are John Griffin, vice-president of global programs at Maxwell Leadership Foundation; Molade Adeniyi, the CEO of West Africa Vocational Education (WAVE); and Hassan Kibirango, iLead director Rwanda.
Students asked to flush out bad leaders
In a related report by Legit.ng, the leadership of the Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) called on northern Nigerian students to be actively involved in politics.
The coalition urged the students to ensure greedy, selfish and unpatriotic leaders are not returned to office in the country.
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Source: Legit.ng
