PROJECT L.E.A.D

Chronicled by Afronuts @ Thursday, March 27, 2008

Today's a day I won't ever forget easily.

It was the day we had a seminar with the students of Lagos State University, Ojo campus. I was among the organizers as well as one of the speakers.

The seminar was titled Project L.E.A.D and we had eminet professionals coming to speak; there was Mrs. Uche Majekodunmi, the owner of Newton & David, a renown interior and exterior decoration and florist outfit which had gathered a number of awards for impact in the industry, we had Gbenga Sesan; an IT professional, powerful speaker and Nigeria's first Information Technology Youth Ambassador who has spoken in over 20 countries, we had Niyi Adesanya, a high profiled speaker whose company Fifth Gear Consulting has addressed and done consulting for mega corporations and high profile individuals, and we also had Emmanuel Effiong-Bright, a Brand Sepcialist whose oratory power of speech is always guranteed to ignite a vicious desire to change in you.





We (Oragnizers) got to the venue, the dramatic theatre hall, at about 7.00am to make sure everything was in place before 10.00am when the program would start.

By 10.30am, the sound engineers were nowhere to be seen, the projector guy was telling us stories over the phone, and some student excos said they needed to build a set in the hall so we were time bound.


Then Tolu, our leader got a call that he had to fill in for another Doctor at work urgently. Now we had to go on without him.


Then our speakers except Mrs Majekodumi, arrived.


Then the Honourable Health Commmitee Chairman from Lagos State House of Assembly, arrived.

And the sound engineers were nowhere to be seen. The projector guy goofed and couldn't get it down to the venue.

And the students were leaving for a test or lecture.

Things were not looking good and it had reached a point where one could give up.

But we needed to act fast and do something. We couldn't afford to give up.

Finally, Kenny, one of our facilitators had to get another sound engineer who got his equipment down to the venue and began to set up. After setting up, the equipment failed to work!


Boy! Did I feel like the devil was seriously after our progress! I said prayers to god under my breath and held on to faith that things will work out.

After waiting for about an hour, The Honourable Chairman took his leave because he had other businesses to attend to.

We had to fashy the projector since all efforts to get one failed.


Finally the sound guy got his equipment working...but his equipment didn't include music! Drat!

We had to think of something. Quickly I got my laptop and plugged it with a connecting cable which we had to wire up using earphone cables and attaching it to the big cables of the sound dashboard. At last Asa's music belted through the huge speakers and the attention and interest of students was ignited.


Niyi Adesanya opened the event by saying a few things to alert interest of the students.


Lin Chung the stand up comic took the stage and got the students laughing. gradually more people began to troop into the auditorium out of curiousity.

Kenny gave a talk on the stock market, I did my stuff on creativity delivering it like I never did before and charged the students up.

By the time speakers took up the mic and began to deliver, more people streamed into the hall. Mrs. majekodunmi joined us by 2.00pm and took the stage. She delivered stuff borne out of her own experience and touched the heart of the students.

Emmanuel Effiong-bright shacked up the audience with powerful issues on branding that set students scribbling madly on their papers.


Gbenga Sesan stirred the audience in an angry delivery of how to get employed without experience using his own personal experiences.


Niyi Adesayna set the students retrospecting and gaping for more with his brief talk on capacity building.


He stated there may be need to come back to LASU to talk more to the students because there was so much to tell them about the outside world, especially the final year students.

The seminar ended very well, students besiged us to get contacts and take pictures. We were so thankful we said a prayer together thanking God for turning things around when everything looked like it would flop. We had spend so much on the event solely with our own money since sponsors failed to respond. (I'll be doing an entry on this issue later). The seminar had been free with no fee attached to it and the students came heard and when they left were not the same again.


I'll put up pictures from the event later as soon as I get them from Ola, one of our facilitators.