-Tony Elumelu
October 22, 2019
By Hassan Gbassay Koroma
Founder of the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF), who also doubles as Chairman of the United Bank for Africa (UBA), Tony O. Elumelu, has called on African youth entrepreneurs to embrace entrepreneurship, noting that they should add hard work, discipline and sacrifice on their entrepreneurial journey to success.
“Entrepreneurship is a long-term journey. There is no quick fix. You will make mistakes. You will have challenges. For you to succeed along this journey you must be disciplined make sacrifices and save today to achieve your goals,” he said.
He was speaking last Wednesday October 16,at the Youth Konnekt Forum in Cape Verde, while addressing young Cape Verdean entrepreneurs in a Forum on the theme “African Youth Foresight and Opportunities”, and also shared nuggets from his wealth of experience as an entrepreneur with success stories investing in Africa.
The conference attracted public sector leaders – the President of Cape Verde, Jorge Carlos de Almeida Fonseca, and Prime Minister, José Ulisses de Pina Ceorreia e Silva, as well as development partners, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
He emphasised the important role of the government in creating an enabling environment for small and medium scale enterprises to thrive while commending the Government of Cape Verde for the strong, deliberate reforms to boost entrepreneurship in Lusophone Africa.
He stated that the future of the African continent is in the hands of the African youths and they must be empowered to achieve the ambition of a well-developed continent.
In his keynote speech, the President of Cape Verde, Jorge Carlos de Almeida Fonseca OICVV, expressed gratitude to Tony Elumelu for pioneering the entrepreneurship movement across the African continent.
“Thank you to Tony Elumelu for what you are doing for young people in Africa especially young people in Cabo Verde” he thanked Tony Elumelu.
The entrepreneurship movement led by the Tony Elumelu Foundation has caught the attention of the African public sector and has rapidly become a defining blueprint for the accelerated development of the African economy.
The aim of the TEF is to leverage the youth population to create jobs, revenue and eradicate poverty on the continent. Thus TEF has empowered 7,531 entrepreneurs across all 54 African countries (19 of whom are from Cape Verde), with plans to again open its application portal for the 6th cohort of its Entrepreneurship Programme on January 1, 2020.
Organised by the National Youth Ministry and the Government of Cape Verde, Youth Konnekt is one of the many plans the country has rolled out to further cement its plans to boost entrepreneurship across the region.