News
TGNYES 2017 Exposes Youths to Business Opportunities, Others Receive IT Training
By peter oluka
The Generation Next Youth Empowerment Summit 2017 (TGNYES) has spurred young people to innovate and put on their thinking cap.
The Summit, an initiative of Elbativeni Foundation and Elbativeni Impressions and Consult invested with the Project’s mission to build youth leaders and empower them with right resources, world class speakers, job opportunities, grants, loan facilities, entrepreneurship ideas and available physical gifts and tools to enhance their lives and held in Abuja recently, was attended by notable dignitaries and speakers including, His Excellency, Ambassador Leopoldo Rovayo Verdesoto, of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Ecuador to Nigeria, and Nigerian Communications Commission’s Executive Vice Chairman’s (EVC) Senior representative, Ms Olawaiye Olasumbo.
Others were: MD of Nanet group, Mr Ini Akpabio; Nigeria’s Former Minister of information, Mr Frank Nweke Jnr.; CEO of Elbativeni Foundation and Elbativeni Impresions and Consult, Ms Destiny Ruth Obiakoeze; CEO of O&S Services, Mr Oba Boniface, CEO of Media Range Ltd, Mr Hassan Abdul; Flex NG’s Mr Kabir Bayo Shittu; Ocean Hill’s Mr Chinonso Opurum; Speaker Arnold Pms Arnold Ayomide Afolayan amongst others.
Nigeria’s former minister of information, Mr Frank Nweke Jr. who was the edition’s “Success Icon” appreciated the team for the vision and seeing themselves as partners in Nigeria’s development emphasized: “I say this because more often than not, we find many people who believe that they have no role to play in national development. So when I meet young people like Destiny and her team who envision this kind of empowerment programmes and it has encouraged others on what must be done; one must duff his hats, one must respect them. So I pay my due respect to them”.
He spurred on participants to ask themselves hard questions and stressed on the need for passion and drive and the desire to push against all odds noting that he had faced challenges over the course of 7 years, implementing an idea that would employ over 15000 people.
The Ambassador of the Republic of Ecuador to Nigeria, H.E Leopoldo R Verdesoto shared varied experiences both as a diplomat, professionally and personally.
According to him, “I have served abroad in three different places, all of them nice from my point of view but they were considered not easy. One of the fact that I carry my career and I am very proud of it is some people didn’t want to go to the places that they had offered me to go but I say okay because for me, it’s a privilege to serve my country and I go! No Wahala on it”.
Nigeria’s Former Minister of information, Mr Frank Nweke Jnr. (m) flanked by CEO of Elbativeni Foundation and Elbativeni Impresions and Consult, Ms Destiny Ruth Obiakoeze; CEO of O&S Services, Mr Oba Boniface, CEO of Media Range Ltd, Mr Hassan Abdul; Flex NG’s Mr Kabir Bayo Shittu; Ocean Hill’s Mr Chinonso Opurum; Speaker Arnold Pms Arnold Ayomide Afolayan
He recounted his diplomatic experiences and the importance of relations to the diaspora citing shared similarities and values of Ecuador and Nigeria including economic.
The Ambassador advised that “youths and young people must be interested in what is going on in their country and their region, their…and make the compromise to go into politics and activism; not to take advantage of managing public funds but to serve their people and their country”.
The Managing Director of Nanet Group and Nanet Hotels, Mr Ini Akpabio, success Icon of the maiden edition and patron of the Summit spoke on “The roles of youths in a united Nigeria”. He raised salient issues of unity stressing that Nigeria had lots of things threatening to divide her.
He noted that the world boasts of youths as Presidents – the 31 year old President of Austria and 39 year old President of France.
He noted that there was need for less discrimination, Full rights of residence in any part of the country, and political and economic emancipation amongst others; mentioning that schemes such as the federal govt colleges, the National Youth Service Corps were great initiatives and were targeted at the unity of the country.
Speaking on some of the take home for youths at the Summit Mr Ini Akpabio said “The Youths are very powerful so the first thing they must do is to recognize their power. The youths don’t know how powerful they are. In exercising their power, they will be able to make changes. The changes I have been advocating are those that can be embedded in our constitution. We should have a percentage set aside…maybe like 25%, and say that at all levels of governance, that 25% must go to the youths; defined as people between the ages of 15 to 35.
Earlier in her welcome address, the CEO of Elbativeni Foundation and Elbativeni Impressions And Consult the hosting organizations of the youth Summit, Ms Destiny Ruth Obiakoeze, explained that the youth Summit was to bring people of different sectors and proffer ideas and actions capable of helping the young people move forward.
She said the idea of the summit remains to fire youths up from the inside to the outside and help them to realize that the things that they want is inside of “them”, that they can make things happen for themselves regardless of the economy, the circumstances of life and that they can do what they want to do to become the leader that they want. She added that the summit was paramount to give hope to youths who did not have hope and give assistance to youths who did not have the right resources to help themselves and empower them with available opportunities.
Nigerian Communication Commission’s Executive Vice Chairman (EVC) who was represented by the Principal Manager in the public affairs department, Ms Olasumbo Olawaiye said that since the youths make up a huge percentage of the telecom consumers ‘the Generation Next Youth Empowerment Summit’ was indeed a great platform to enlighten them on the various telecom issues.
The Commission had earlier in March 2017 flagged off the ‘year of the Telecom Consumer Campaign’ focused on the needs and satisfaction of the Nigerian Telecom Consumer of which part of its purpose is to inform and educate the consumer with the sole intent of protecting and empowering them to make the right decisions and from unfair practices of network operators.
The Commission in its eight point agenda with two being to improve the quality of service and a sixth which is to protect and empower consumers specifically addressed… Key components of the campaign in the year of the Telecom Consumers Include: Creation of great awareness of quality of service; research based fact on electromagnetic field radiation; The do-not-disturb code,2442 and the NCC toll free 622 line.
Noting that information was very important for the youths and users of telecom services to be properly aware in their consumer experiences, she said the, “Do-Not-Disturb code 2442 is a dedicated command short code which will enable consumers to stop unsolicited text messages, including voice and take informed and independent decision of what messages to receive from the network and protect themselves from the nuisance of unsolicited messages and take it as a direct response to the yearning of subscribers.
During the Entrepreneurship session, Mr Oba Boniface who facilitated the session said that the difference between a successful entrepreneurs and the unsuccessful entrepreneurs were their abilities to bring out revenue out of rubbish, see prosperity out of problems, and cash out of crisis.
According to him, there was need for youths to see entrepreneurship as a great option and see the business in problem. They need to see opportunities in problems.
They need to think of how to add value to others and increase their integrity since innovation in a better way to solving people’s problems. They need to be ready to invest in their own businesses and ideas and not just expecting others to invest in them.
The Summit also hosted an innovative mind teaser session hosted by the Technical Director of the Nigerian Scrabble federation, Mr Farouk Babaina.
In a session on Brand Power, the CEO of Media Range Ltd, Mr Hassan Abdul taught that there were series of things that were important to becoming more marketable as personal and business brands and it is indeed important to increase performances in them. Attributes that differentiate individuals and business in the industry must be developed and improved.
Cross section of guests and speakers at the Summit
According Mr Hassan Abdul, Personal branding can accelerate communications strategy, ease career transitions, increases long term career and business objectives as well as expected outcomes.
He spoke on the essence of communications and branding to individuals and business and how to leverage its capacities in life and business.
Mr. Peter Oluka, IT Correspondent with the Nigerian Communications Week coordinated the ‘opportunities Panel‘ with CEO of MicroFlex,-Mr Kabil Shittu; CoFounder of Ocean Hill, Mr Nonso Oprum; Representative of Elbativeni Foundation, Ms Biodun Ogundipe where opportunities for soft loans, Business support services and ICT Training for women were offered participants.
The last session was the Google Digital Skills for Africa session facilitated by the CEO of the hosting company and foundation- Elbativeni Impressions and Consult and Elbativeni Foundation., Ms Destiny Ruth Obiakoeze.
The session highlighted the need for an online presence, the opportunities available through online presence and possible career opportunities that youths could leverage to earn money.
Given Google’s target to train 10 million African’s especially youths, the session explored digitals skills, the need to be digitally savvy and increase the use of technology online and in businesses.
According to Destiny, the future of technology would considerably progress and will continue to be profitable considering the principles of the digital world.
However she noted that youths have incredible opportunities with the advent of technology and the digital world than ever before.
Some of the success stories of the year’s event was achievements of the free admission for participants at the summit, exposure to world class resources, facilitators and speakers including:
Ten (10) Start Up Business winning FREE Business Support services; 20 Ladies selected from participants to attend FREE SIX MONTHS ICT training from February 2018 to July 2018; Soft Loans; Job Opportunities for select participants and Free Summit shirts won by raffle.
According to The Generation Next Youth Empowerment Summit’s Convener, Ms Destiny Ruth Obiakoeze, Now, we are looking forward to 2018.
The Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa, CCIE, has reaffirmed Nigeria’s commitment to open governance, transparency and inclusive digital development as the Open Government Partnership (OGP) team formally presented the award and certificate received at the OGP Global Summit Spain 2025 to the Agency’s leadership.
Nigeria emerged as the overall global winner in the Digital Governance category in recognition of the country’s excellence in deploying digital tools and policies to strengthen government transparency, accountability, and citizen engagement. In addition, Nigeria received the Regional Award for advancing Open Digital Governance across Africa and the Middle East, reaffirming its leadership role in promoting open government principles and driving digital transformation across the region.
These recognitions were largely attributed to initiatives led by NITDA in collaboration with civil society partners, such as Dataphyte, which showcased innovative and inclusive approaches to digital governance at the summit.
The summit, which was organised in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain, brought together more than 1,500 high-level representatives of governments, civil society leaders, and policymakers from around the world to exchange experiences, best practices, and progress on open government initiatives and implementation on key issues.
Receiving the OGP delegation at NITDA, Inuwa described the recognition as a national honour rather than an institutional one, stressing that the award reflects Nigeria’s collective efforts across government, civil society and the private sector in advancing open governance principles through the digital space.
According to him, such global recognition comes with heightened responsibility to deliver on commitments made under the OGP framework.
“This is not just about NITDA. It is a national recognition, and every recognition comes with responsibility,” the DG said.
“If we fail to execute the commitments we have made, it will not only affect our image locally but also at the international stage. This is also not something NITDA can do in isolation,” he added.
Inuwa linked the achievement directly to the Renewed Hope Agenda of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, noting that digital transformation, transparency, economic diversification, job creation and efficient public service delivery remain central presidential priority areas.
He emphasised that leveraging digital technologies to deepen openness and accountability aligns with national objectives of strengthening institutions, improving governance outcomes and building trust between government and citizens.
Highlighting the importance of collaboration, the NITDA boss underscored the role of the OGP platform as a catalyst for a strong multi-stakeholder approach in Nigeria’s digital ecosystem.
He called on civil society organisations, development partners, the private sector and other government institutions to provide technical expertise, guidance and sustained engagement to ensure effective implementation of agreed commitments.
“We need to leverage the OGP platform. We need your expertise, your guidance, your support and your commitment to hand-hold us in delivering on these commitments,” he said.
He further noted that “a multi-stakeholder approach in the digital space is critical to fostering a resilient ecosystem that delivers real value to citizens.”
Inuwa disclosed that NITDA has already begun internal reviews of its OGP commitments and has tasked its representatives, including Dr Rousseau, to work with colleagues to develop a clear execution strategy.
He proposed the creation of joint work streams with OGP stakeholders to support implementation, ensure accountability and keep all parties on track.
“We are humans. Oversight and collaboration help us stay focused. With commitment, nothing is impossible, and I believe these goals are achievable,” he added, assuring the delegation of NITDA’s readiness and political will to deliver on all agreed commitments.
Inuwa also welcomed the idea of engaging the political leadership of OGP, including the Honourable Minister of Budget and Economic Planning, with a view to briefing President Tinubu on the achievement. He noted that celebrating milestones is important, as it reinforces morale and demonstrates that Nigeria’s efforts in digital governance are gaining global recognition.
“It’s also good when there are wins, we should celebrate, because we too never knew that the little things we are doing are noticed not just within Nigeria, but globally, to the extent of earning us this award,” he asserted.
He concluded by expressing gratitude to the Nigerian National OGP Secretariat and the global OGP leadership, reaffirming NITDA’s commitment to strengthening collaboration and building a more productive working relationship that will translate open governance principles into measurable national impact.
Earlier in his remark, Mr Olusoji Apampa, who led the OGP deelegation, said the honours were earned through a strong partnership between government and civil society, with NITDA playing a critical role, particularly in commitments focused on improving digital governance in Nigeria.
Apampa expressed hope that the awards would serve as added momentum to deepen ongoing commitments under NITDA’s leadership and accelerate the practical implementation of reforms aimed at strengthening digital governance across the country.
PalmPay, Nigeria’s leading digital banking platform, has announced the launch of its ₦400 million festive rewards campaign, designed to reward users with cash prizes and fully sponsored international travel experiences for everyday transactions on the PalmPay app.
The campaign will run from December 17, 2025, to January 8, 2026. The campaign is designed to reward everyday transactions with extraordinary experiences. It runs alongside PalmPay’s Purple December brand campaign, which focuses on wrapping up the company’s key brand and community initiatives for the year.
At the centre of the rewards campaign is the PalmPay World Travel Carnival, an interactive card collection experience that allows users to earn city cards by completing transactions on the app. Users are required to collect five city cards – London, New York, Dubai, Sydney, and Cape Town and combine them into a World Card, which unlocks a share of the prize pool.
The more World Cards a user creates, the larger their share of the cash rewards. Any extra uncombined cards can be swapped with friends and other PalmPay users to help complete additional World Cards.
Beyond cash rewards, the Carnival also offers Free Global Trips. In each round, the top two users with the highest number of eligible transactions (₦100 and above) and at least one World Card will win an all-expense-paid international trip.
The travel grand prize covers:
- Visa fees
- Round-trip international airfare
- 5-day, 4-night hotel accommodation
- Side attraction
- Meal expenses
- Airport pick-up and drop-off
- All transportation for scheduled tour activities during the trip
Winners will be determined through a transparent leaderboard system, with prizes credited automatically at the end of each round on December 25, December 31, and January 8.
Participation is simple:
- Complete tasks on the PalmPay app, such as Airtime, Data, Transfers, and other specific transactions listed in the app, to earn cards.
- Collect all five city cards.
- Swap cards with friends to complete your collection.
- Combine cards to form a World Card and earn cash rewards.
- Perform more transactions to climb the leaderboard for a chance at the global trip prize.
To ensure fairness, PalmPay has instituted strict rules: no cheating, bots, fake accounts, or manipulation. Any violations may lead to disqualification or account bans. Additionally, the Free Travel Prize is limited to one per user throughout the campaign.
Speaking on the launch, Femi Hanson, Head of Marketing & Communication, “This festive rewards campaign is about turning everyday banking into meaningful value for our users. With the World Travel Carnival as the headline activation, we are reinforcing PalmPay’s promise of being the smarter way to bank—where smart financial decisions unlock bigger opportunities.”
The Rural Electrification Agency (REA) and the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to conduct a nationwide energy survey aimed at closing long-standing data gaps in Nigeria’s power sector. The initiative is expected to guide policy, attract investment, and accelerate universal electricity access.
Signed in Abuja, the agreement establishes a National Energy Survey based on the Multi-Tier Tracking Framework (MTF), a globally recognized methodology that measures electricity access not only by grid connection but also by quality, affordability, reliability, and usage of electricity and clean cooking solutions.
The survey will be implemented under the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP) of the World Bank. Dr. Abba Aliyu, REA Managing Director/CEO, said the partnership underscores REA’s commitment to evidence-based rural electrification planning and will generate detailed insights on electricity access and off-grid solutions nationwide.
Prince Adeyemi Adeniran, Statistician-General of the Federation/CEO of NBS, emphasized that reliable statistics are essential for effective policymaking, assuring that NBS will provide technical oversight, sampling expertise, and quality assurance to meet global standards.
The survey will assess energy access, household affordability, expenditure patterns, and the adoption of off-grid technologies such as solar home systems, mini-grids, and clean cooking solutions. REA will provide sector expertise and policy alignment, while NBS manages regulatory approvals, methodology, and technical supervision.
Funded and technically overseen by the World Bank, the exercise will run for 18 months, with the resulting data expected to improve national energy planning, programme targeting, and private sector investment, particularly in underserved and rural communities.
Officials said the collaboration reflects the Federal Government’s commitment to strengthening inter-agency coordination, enhancing energy data availability, and advancing Nigeria’s goal of universal electricity and clean cooking access.
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