A leadership development organisation, Guardians Of the Nation International (GOTNI) is looking to raise a generation of new leaders for Nigeria, as the 2014 Emerging Leaders Conference opens in Abuja, the nation’s capital.
At the first day of the conference on Friday, some of the invited guests said Nigeria needed young leaders who would take responsibility for the change they wanted to see.
The conference with the theme, Leadership For Transformation, is a gathering of young people from different parts of the country.
The President of the GOTNI, Linus Okorie, said Nigeria needed a lot of investment in building the leadership capacity of young people.
He told Channels Television on Sunday that the two-day conference would afford participants the opportunity to discuss leadership and enable them chart a course on how they could change Nigeria’s future.
According to Mr Okorie, the conference is a leadership development system that will build a huge network of young people from all over the country who are doing great things.
“We will adopt a peer review mechanism, where a young person from Ekiti may think that he is doing something great but at the conference he would see someone that is doing four times better and it will inspire them to think Nigeria and act Nigeria
“GOTNI has been asking Nigeria, for the past 18 years, to give young people an opportunity to grow in leadership content which will enable them define and redefine the future of our country
“So I am bringing young leaders together so that we can redefine this country and set this country on a part of gold,” he stressed.
To help the young aspiring leaders gathered for the event, invited speakers spoke on the need for quality leadership and offered some tips.
The conference was chaired by Jerry Gana while the Minister of Youth Development, Boni Haruna, the Governor of Ekiti State, Kayode Fayemi and the British High Commission to Nigeria, Dr. Andrew Pocock, also made their contributions.
Some of the speakers also touched on the security challenges confronting the nation and offered their thoughts on possible solutions.
The conference, which seeks to empower young people for leadership, will hopefully bring up young leaders that will be the change Nigeria needs.