Media Trust, Otubela Foundation unite for African children

At a time access to education has become a challenge for many African children, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), Otunba Yomi Otubela Foundation (YOF) and Media Trust Limited, publishers of Daily Trust Newspaper titles, have decided to extend said their hands of fellowship to assist children of the poor in accessing qualitative education through scholarship awards. […]

At a time access to education has become a challenge for many African children, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), Otunba Yomi Otubela Foundation (YOF) and Media Trust Limited, publishers of Daily Trust Newspaper titles, have decided to extend said their hands of fellowship to assist children of the poor in accessing qualitative education through scholarship awards.
Indeed, when the men and women behind the scholarship package for the African children met a few days ago at Lagooz Schools, Lagos, they left no one in doubt of the determination that has become the driving force for a cause they are so much committed to.
Playing the frontline role was the initiator himself, Otunba Yomi Otubela, whose many years of humanitarian efforts are best captured under the YOF, the foundation named after him.
“YOF is a non-governmental, non-religious and non- organisation designed and founded as a humanitarian-ecclesia to birth, propagate and sustain the advancement of the  African child and woman’s socio-moral and socio-economic status, but not excluding the male,” Otubela said as he led his guests into the business of the day.
According to the YOF founder, the whole idea of the scholarship programme with which the NGO struck partnership with Media Trust, is geared towards contributing meaningfully to education in Nigeria in particular and Africa in general.
Among other things, he added, the scholarship objectives include: arousing the spirit of academic competition among primary and secondary school children, re-emphasising the importance of mathematics as a necessary tool for problem solving, supporting public and private schools in the fight to give education a qualitative status, supporting less-privileged learners and encouraging gifted children in attaining their goals.
The Scholarship Coordinator, Lawal Adeniyi, gave an insight into the programme’s modus operandi. He said the contest for the award is opened to children in primary 5 and 6, JS1-3 as well as SS1 and SS2 of between nine and 15 years, covering seven classes in all.
“The scholarship award will be given purely on merit. The examination will be strictly supervised by experts. The questions will be selected from both the federal and states’ schemes of work. The marking will be computer-based and the handling and finishing will be properly supervised. At the end of the day, successful candidates will be invited for final interview,” Adeniyi said.
The Scholarship Coordinator further noted that the gesture is designed in two schemes: partial and full scholarship. For the partial scholarship, the benefitting African child whose parent could no longer afford to pay his regular school bills would be assisted by YOF which would be paying a lion’s share on the tuition through the child’s primary and secondary school as long as he or she remains in the school where he or she has been awarded.
The full scholarship arrangement, Adeniyi said, involves the beneficiary enjoying totally-free scholarship as he may live as a boarder on the school campus or even enroll as a day student. It also includes provision of every material that the child needs during the course of his or her education.
“The two categories of the African child that may enjoy this scholarship which is worth over N5 million per child are those categorised as ‘A’ pupil/student and abandoned orphans from Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camp or otherwise,” he added.
Speaking on behalf of Media Trust Limited, the General Manager, Southern Operations, Ademola Oladosu, said the partnership between the organisation and YOF came up because both parties have a lot in common, especially in the area of philanthropic gestures.
He recalled some of Media Trust’s ongoing humanitarian gestures such as granting of scholarship awards to medical students in  universities across Nigeria, raising and donating financial and material resources to IDPs, the annual African Man of the Year Award and sponsoring stakeholders’ summits on various sectors of the economy, among others.
Rounding up the discourse, Otubela said the partnership between YOF and Media Trust is renewable every year, adding that the media organisation will be handling all issues relating to the scholarship’s media and publicity.