In commemoration of the International Youth’s month, a young Nigerian who just returned from the United States is worth celebrating.
Ifenla (Damilola) Oligbinde is a young Nigerian woman who is showing the world that Nigerian youths are going global. With several years of experience in project and community-driven development and management, she has worked in both private and public sectors in the past 10 years, including companies, non governmental organizations, international governmental organizations and a political party.
With an undergraduate and post graduate background in law, she has a certification in public policy from the African Civic Engagement Academy at the University of Georgia. Oligbinde is passionate about advancing democratic and inclusive values through advocacy, good governance, gender equality, and education. Her expertise came handy on her appointment by the African Democratic Congress, as the party’s National Director of Communications and Programs three years ago. She has improved the party’s publicity, digital communications, and youths and women driven programs. The height of her works at the party was the 300 Spartans Project, which saw to screen, shortlist, and select 300 capable youths and women to run for different seats in the just concluded elections in Nigeria.
She is the founder of Ark and Rainbow Movement, a non-profit organization that provides policy based, leadership, governance, capacity building and project management services and Mind and Ink Consult, a writing, ideation, and restructuring consulting firm. Ifenla was the Public Relations Officer of the Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) and an Alumnus of the YALI Regional Leadership Center West Africa Cohort 13.
Ifenla has spoken on over 50 platforms as a public speaker and facilitator, as a means to advance youth and women participation in politics; encourage government and non government bodies to be more structured, as well as build capacity of youths across the globe.
As a result of her positive impact in Nigeria, she was the first and only Nigerian to be selected for the 2023 McCain Global Leaders Program. The program, which is divided into Leadership and Legacy Experience, and Changemakers Tour has about 28 Global Leaders, competitively selected from all continents of the world.
The program follows the leadership journey and principles of Senator McCain, guiding and allowing them to directly engage with high-level leaders in private industry, government, academia, and non-profits. The experience also connects them with experts and organizations working on technical areas in leadership and governance, with the goal of expanding their professional network and gaining insight into how they can increase the impact of their works. Ifenla represented Nigeria in Annapolis, Maryland, and Washington DC at the United States of America for the Leadership Experience and will be in South Africa for the Changemakers Tour and Vietnam for the Legacy Experience.
Ifenla Oligbinde was also selected for the Mandela Washington Fellowship, a fully funded leadership program by the Department of States of the United States of America. She was one of the 700 competitively selected African leaders, and she proceeded to Cornell University and Ivy League learning institute, where she studied Leadership in Public Management at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York. Her 6 weeks course has gotten her a certificate of honour from the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies and Jeb E. Brooks School of Public Policy at Cornell University, as well as the Department of States, through the Mandela Washington Fellowship.
The young Nigerian woman is not resting on her feet, as she is determined to engage all necessary actors in Nigeria’s polity, for an even accommodation and participation of women and youths in leadership. Presently, Ifenla is consulting with stakeholders on different projects that would create thousands of jobs for Nigerian youths, as well as build their capacity towards being prepared for leadership roles.
