Social Conscience

The African Development Bank said 22 percent of Africa's working-age population are starting businesses, and this is the highest entrepreneurship rate in the world. Small and Medium Enterprises are now the biggest formal employers in Sub-Saharan Africa and will undoubtedly be key in creating the 54 million jobs that Africa is expected to create by 2022.
The numbers look great until one realizes that Sub-Saharan Africa also has the highest small business discontinuance rate of 8.4%. While the job creation potential is promising, it is a far cry from the demands - Africa will need 122 million new jobs by 2022. Further, only 20 percent of African entrepreneurs are introducing new products and services. Africa has a lot of survival entrepreneurs who were pushed into entrepreneurship by unemployment.
Vital Sounouvou holds a bachelor’s degree in Telecommunications and Software Engineering from the UIT de Calais in France, and a Business certificate from the University of Texas at Austin. Listed on Forbes Africa's 30 under 30 lists of 2016. His professional life spans from the Annual Investment Meeting of the United Arab Emirates government where he managed African relations, to the Corporate Council on Africa in Washington D.C, and Microsoft’s Johannesburg offices. Fellow of President Obama’s Initiative for Young African Leaders (YALI), of the Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Program, Ashoka, Techstars, and Stanford SEED.
Vital has extensive experience doing trade between sub-Saharan Africa, the United States of America, and the Middle East, through trade representation deals with manufacturing companies.

Detoun Ogwo is a Development and Human Resources Practitioner passionate about making a difference in the skills & youth employment sector. She is An Ashoka fellow with a 20-year career, spanning various industries from FMCG to Aviation and Financial Services.
Currently, she sits on the board of The Skills Development Practice, The Abira Foundation & was a pioneer ED & Co-founder of a National Career Centre, AGDC.
She’s currently a doctoral researcher at the University College London’s Institute of Education and an External Collaborator on the International Labour Organization’s mapping process of Nigeria’s National Youth Employment Inventory, along with strategic action lines of “4Es”: Employment, Entrepreneurship, and Employability & Leadership.

Abosede George-Ogan is a tri-sector leader who has worked across the non-profit, private, and public sectors as a development professional. She was one-time, Director, Strategy, Funding, and Stakeholder Management at the Lagos State Employment Trust Fund (LSETF) contributing her quota to job creation in the State. As the Co-founder of ElectHER – a women’s political advancement initiative that seeks to address the under-representation of women in elective office in Nigeria, through behavioral change, communication skills development, and funding mobilization - Abosede is on a new mission to increase women’s political representation in Nigeria.
The goal of ElectHER is to engage, encourage, equip, and enable women to Decide, Run, and Win elections.
To my listeners, please feel free to weigh in by sending your questions or comments to @africabizradio on Twitter with the hashtag SCWN.

Prince Adekinte Ademiju Oyekan, PSC - a Law graduate from the University of Wales, United Kingdom.
He was the former Chairman of the Task Force on Petroleum Distribution in Rivers State and has served in various States and formations including - Police Mobile Force (PMF), Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and Divisional Police Officer (DPO).
He was the one-time Area Commander for Ajaokuta in Kogi State, Assistant Commissioner of Police – Operations, Ogun State and Assistant Commissioner of Police – Administration, Kwara State
Prince Oyekan joined the Nigeria Police Force in January 1984 as a Cadet Inspector and retired exactly 35 years later, in January 2019 as the Commissioner of Police - Training, at the Force Headquarters, Abuja.

A couple of years ago, I recall feeling tired, generally unwell, and a bit cranky – being a hypochondriac, I went to the hospital and all my tests came back fine, so I was asked to just get some rest. A few days after, I still didn’t feel 100%, so I went back again, and the doctor confirmed for the umpteenth time that there was nothing wrong with me physiologically. But this time, she proceeded to ask me a few questions about my lifestyle, work etcetera, and then she made me complete a short form that was meant to help assess my state of mind albeit at a high level. After the consultation, the Dr. recommended a low dose of anti-depressants and to practice “mindfulness”. Now that’s not the story, it was the reaction of family members that I told that the doctor had recommended anti-depressants that got me. From shouts of I reject in Jesus’ name to we don’t have depression in Africa. Suffice to say, I didn’t take the meds and figured there was nothing a bit of rest wouldn’t address. As educated and exposed as I was, I lowkey subscribed to the notion that as an African – depression was not a thing.
With such socio-cultural beliefs, it is no wonder that Africa as a region has a very low mental healthcare worker to patient ratio of 1.4 per 100,000 compared with a global average of 9.0 per 100,000.
This is more mind-boggling when the link is made to Africa’s growing youth population who are already struggling to earn a livelihood in highly competitive labor markets and the susceptibility to mental disorder.

Chinasa is joined by Dr. Kenneth Uwajeh to discuss the topic, "Empowering the African Youth: The case for Mental Independence".
Dr. Kenneth Uwajeh - executive director of the Healthy Mind foundation and a West Africa certified specialist in Psychiatry with a Master’s in Public Health from George Washington University.

One of the key objectives of the foundation is to expunge the stigma around mental illness through an intervention called the Psych to CEO. A 360-degree mental health service delivery system that takes a patient from the psychiatric wards to the CEO suite. Kenneth strongly believes that mental resilience gives emotional and financial freedom.

Healthy Mind, Foundation, through various partners has served over 1 million Nigerians through awareness, coaching, mentoring, medication, and therapy solutions both online and in-person.

Kenneth as a past Rotary president, Resident Doctors president, Student Ambassador at George Washington, and an award-winning Toastmaster has used his leadership platforms to spread the gospel of mental health.

His ultimate desire is to share the gospel of mental health as a panacea for the African situation which is hinged on Freedom: the choice to choose our state of Mind.

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation celebrated its 60th independence anniversary yesterday and ironically, its average population age is 18.2 thus boasting of a youthful population that promises huge dividends. Nigeria is 60, average age is 18 – A substantial number of African countries today are only between 43 to 60 years old post-independence, but the average age of leaders is 80 while the average population age is 19.
Are the youth really the leaders of tomorrow, because so far, they haven’t, and if they have, they are very few and far between.
To share his perspectives on the topic is none other than Akintunde Oyebode - an economist and finance professional, with over two decades of experience working in various industries within the private sector. His foray into public service formally started in 2015 when he joined the Lagos State Employment Trust Fund (LSETF) as its pioneer Executive Secretary/CEO during which he achieved great feats in driving the development of MSMEs as a catalyst to tackle Youth Unemployment. In 2019, he voluntarily left this role and joined the Ekiti State Government as Special Adviser and Director General of the Ekiti State Development and Investment Promotion Agency. Until recently, he led the state’s drive to attract domestic and international investment. In August 2020, Akintunde was appointed Commissioner of Finance & Economic Development for Ekiti State government.

Africa is rising they say, but Africa must rise with its people; There is no Africa without its people... how then do we harness Africa's wealth in people... through Social Change and Development.
Social Conscience with 'Nasa commits to Aspiration 6 of the Africa Agenda 2063 and the Global Development Goals. We advocate social change and development that will inspire the transformation that keeps Africa rising.