FAREWELL SPEECH PRESENTED BY THE PRESIDENT AT THE INAUGURATION OF THE 2021 EXECUTIVE MEMBERS OF THE YALI RLC ALUMNI ASSOCIATION IN NIGERIA ON 3RD JANUARY, 2021.
FAREWELL SPEECH PRESENTED BY THE PRESIDENT AT THE INAUGURATION OF THE 2021 EXECUTIVE MEMBERS OF THE YALI RLC ALUMNI ASSOCIATION IN NIGERIA ON 3RD JANUARY, 2021.
Representative of the US Consulate in Nigeria
Representative of the RLC, Ghana
Past President(s)
Executive members and Regional Representatives in Nigeria
Colleagues and leaders
It’s my pleasure to be opening a new Alumni year with a farewell address. It’s one year since my team and I took over office having enjoyed your overwhelming support to lead as President.
Today, I am glad to be stepping aside for another set of leaders to handle the activities of our association. I also want to commend the independent Electoral Committee (IEC) led by Ms Peace Chime, for making history by conducting the most transparent and credible election in our association which delivered the next leaders to steer the course of our association.
It is worthy of note that this is the first time we are having a woman lead the IEC in the capacity of the chairperson and this has proven that having women in leadership makes all the difference. And it is inline with our resolve to manage and hand over an association that will continue to provide equal opportunities for everyone as I mentioned in my campaign manifesto.
Within the past one year of leading one of the prestigious US Exchange Alumni Associations in Nigeria, we have been faced with challenges and also recorded unprecedented wins as I would highlight a few of them briefly.
We took over on the 29th of December, 2019 and commenced fully in January 2020 with the launch of an assessment survey to capture the needs and areas of priorities for the association. After due consultations, we submitted our action plan to the RLC and the Embassy.
Our action plan captured more physical projects across the geo political zones aimed at empowering communities, supporting members’ initiatives, driving impacts for Network hubs and proffering solutions to economic, social and cultural challenges. And we also made plans for very limited online engagements with members. Unfortunately, when we were struck by the global pandemic, it didn’t only stopped our proposed projects but disrupted our action plans, behavioural response and doused our high spiritedness.
Needs changed, priorities altered, communities locked down and activities suspended. We found ourselves struggling to be counted as survivors rather than aspiring to make a change.
With this backdrop, we mustered strength to provide assistance to members as communities needed help than us and we did the following projects:
● First ever online diagnostic initiative (YALI FIRST AID) that provided medical attention to people who could not access medical facilities but suffered from illnesses unrelated to the Covid19.
● We leveraged on the expertise of our certified members in this field across the country and we successfully attended to many people with ease to medical facilities for follow up. This brought succour to many as we received from our feedback mechanism. This project lasted with the lockdowns and ended with the ease of curfews.
● We partnered the Sunshine Mindwellness to provide mental health counseling and therapy to people who needed it as many were devastated and struggling with many emotional challenges.
● We took on the regular publication of alumni engagements called the alumni spotlight to promote the activities of members and show impacts for visibility while our regional representatives held programs as part of our broad plan.
● We intervened in complaints between the RLC selection committee and our Nigerian applicants to give confidence to the credibility of our process and training programs.
● We facilitated the first RLC — Chapters roundtable which started in Nigeria and will continue with our counterparts.
We have observed and requested for expansion in YALI funding for our members involved in other non-entrepreneurial tracks evidential in the first YALI Alumni marketplace slated to hold in South Africa this year.
While a lot of members had waited to see more of the online work as it has always been, we were persuaded to take up these challenging courses with long term returns for our association. We have always known that an association is only as strong as the people in it and with the great minds in YALI RLC Nigeria alumni, we deserve a better place in the committee of exchange programs with greater visibility on the global map.
This had informed most of our silent decisions but attracted unusual criticisms by some members. We remained resolute in the face of many challenges because we had noble leaders like Aisha Bubah, Ugochi Obidiegwu, Chika Ugochi and other well meaning members who always provided perspectives and counsel that kept our team going.
I am making this as an appreciation and also expecting that others will give more support to the incoming Executives.
Finally, let me thank RLC for their unwavering support to us by always obliging our submissions for consideration. As we start a new year, let us recommit ourselves to the values that guide us as young African leaders and fix our minds on creating solutions to help the many underserved areas of our country and continent.
Congratulations to the new Executives and I wish you the best of 2021.
Emediong Akpabio
President (2020–2021)
