News — nigerian

Educated youth from the slums of Mumbai, India started the Dalit Panther Movement (DPM) in June 1972, inspired by Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar and the U.S. Black Panthers.  Dalits (“downtrodden”) are the lowest “untouchable” caste in Hinduism.  Hinduism views Dalits as sinners in their prior lives who can only redeem themselves by being good servants of the high castes.

In the 1920s Ambedkar, a Dalit who was a primary author of the Indian Constitution, tried to end Dalit oppression by giving them political power.  In writing the draft of the Indian Constitution in 1933, Ambedkar reserved a portion of all elected positions for Dalits and only Dalits could vote for these positions.  Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi, a high-caste Hindu, opposed political power as a solution to Dalit oppression.  He protested Ambekdar’s work by going on a hunger strike which precipitated the slaughter of thousands of Dalits.  Afraid of more deaths, Ambedkar backed down and eliminated this provision of the Constitution.  Because of continued Hindu oppression of Dalits, Ambedkar converted to Buddhism in 1956.  His conversion led to mass conversions of other Dalits to Buddhism.

Given their lack of political power, most Dalits continue to have very menial or degrading jobs such as removing human waste, dead animals, or sweeping streets.  Dalits comprise 18% of the Indian population, and they face ongoing segregation in schools and restaurants, police violence, sexual violence, and even lack access to drinking water.

DPM selected the name “Dalit Panthers,” after reading about the U.S. Black Panthers in Time magazine.  The DPM combined the work of Ambedkar with the militancy and self-defense of the Black Panthers to combat atrocities against Dalits.  DPM co-founders Namedo Dhasal, Raja Dhale, J. V. Pawar, and Arun Kamble were poets and writers.  Their anti-establishment poetry and short stories published in Dhasal’s magazine Vidroh (“Revolt”) were powerful realistic descriptions of the oppression of Dalits and their revolutionary struggles for change.  DPM also used self-defense in response to atrocities against Dalits, held election boycotts, demonstrated against the ruling Congress Party, and attacked Hindu deities to protest Dalit caste oppression.

In 1973 the DPM published their manifesto integrating Marxist capitalist exploitation with Buddhism, identifying Dalit enemies as landlords, capitalists, money-lenders and the government controlled by ruling castes.  They also expanded the term Dalits to include other oppressed peoples such as low (Scheduled) castes, neo-Buddhists, landless and poor peasants, and exploited women.  The notoriety of the DPM’s poems, short stories, and street protests led to the rapid growth of over 30 loosely organized groups of the DPM in Mumbai.

In 1974 the DPM leaders Dhasal and Dhale disagreed about having a Marxism-Buddhism ideology versus a strictly Buddhist identity.  Outside pressures on DPM included intense police surveillance and Indira Gandhi’s State of Emergency from 1975- 1977.  On March 7, 1977 Dhasal and Pawar announced the dissolution of the DPM as a result of this infighting and political repression.

DPM’s legacy is seen in Dalit literature and politics.  The writings of  PM poets and writers helped establish Dalit literature as a major literary form, and Dhasal became one of India’s leading poets.  The DPM has also had a lasting impact on Indian politics.  Shortly after the dissolution of the DPM, Kamble and other DPM leaders formed the Bharatiya Dalit Panthers (BDP) when Emergency Rule ended in March 21, 1977.  The BDP expanded across India to nearly 20 states, and was most active near the India-Nepal border and in Tamil Nadu in southern India.  In Tamil the party is known as the DPI.  It is now the major Dalit political party in Tamil fighting against Dalit oppression.

Nigeria’s Umaru Dikko was the minister of transport in the civilian government run by Shehu Shagari from 1979 until the end of 1983 when the country’s army overthrew the administration and installed Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari as the head of state. The new military government under Buhari jailed scores of government ministers under Shagari’s administration for corruption. Dikko, who criticized the military regime under Buhari, managed to flee to London reportedly dressed as a priest.

While in London, he continued to be an outspoken critic of the military government, which also accused him of corruption and of stealing millions of dollars from a rice distribution program he was in charge of. Dikko denied the accusations. Still, the military government labeled him as “Nigeria’s most wanted man” and devised a plan to kidnap him off the streets of London and bring him back to Nigeria to face trial.

The Independent reported that Nigerian intelligence services and undercover agents (alongside several Israelis who were alleged to be members of Israel’s intelligence agency, Mossad) tracked Dikko to a house in west London. The joint Nigerian-Israeli team placed the former minister’s house under surveillance. An Israeli alleged former Mossad agent, Alexander Barak, reportedly led the kidnap team, which included a Nigerian intelligence officer, Maj Mohammed Yusufu, and Israeli nationals Felix Abitbol and Dr. Lev-Arie Shapiro. One of the team members was to inject Dikko with an anesthetic.

On July 5, 1984, Dikko was kidnapped outside his home in London, bundled into the back of a van and locked in a large crate addressed to the Nigerian Ministry of External Affairs in the then capital city, Lagos. The kidnappers injected Dikko before laying him, unconscious, in the crate with the Israeli anesthetist by his side in the crate to keep him breathing. Barak and Abitbol were in a second crate. The two boxes were sealed. The kidnappers drove Dikko to Stansted airport to put him on a waiting Nigerian cargo plane to be flown back to Lagos.

Unknown to the kidnappers, Dikko’s secretary had witnessed the abduction. She called the police. The British government subsequently ordered customs officials at airports, ports and border crossings to be extremely observant when inspecting Nigeria-bound vessels. At Stansted, one young customs officer, Charles David Morrow, having heard about the news of a kidnapping, ordered the crates to be opened just when the Nigerian cargo plane was minutes from taking off.

“The day had gone fairly normally until about 3 pm. Then we had the handling agents come through and say that there was a cargo due to go on a Nigerian Airways 707, but the people delivering it didn’t want it manifested,” Morrow recalled what happened to the BBC.

“I went downstairs to see who they were and what was happening. I met a guy who turned out to be a Nigerian diplomat called Mr Edet. He showed me his passport and he said it was diplomatic cargo. Being ignorant of such matters, I asked him what it was, and he told me it was just documents and things.”

Morrow said Nigerian intelligence officials and diplomatic staff argued that the crates could not be opened as they were protected by diplomatic immunity.

Morrow knew that any cargo designated as a diplomatic bag is protected by the Vienna Convention from being opened by customs officers. Thus, he got on the phone to the British Foreign Office.”To qualify as a ‘diplomatic bag’ they clearly had to be marked with the words ‘Diplomatic Bag’ and they had to be accompanied by an accredited courier with the appropriate documentation. It was fair to say they had a Nigerian diplomat – I’d seen his passport – but they didn’t have the right paperwork and they weren’t marked ‘Diplomatic Bag’,” he said.

The final decision was that the crates could be opened. Customs officers called anti-terrorist police, cordoned off the area and evacuated airport staff. They then opened the crate in the presence of the police. They found Dikko unconscious inside one of the crates. Next to him was the doctor who had injected him.

“He [Dikko] had no shirt on, he had a heart monitor on him, and he had a tube in his throat to keep his airway open. No shoes and socks and handcuffs around his ankles. The Israeli anesthetist was in there, clearly to keep him alive,” recalled Morrow.

Customs officials found the other kidnappers in the other crate. “I remember the very violent way in which I was grabbed and hurled into a van, with a huge fellow sitting on my head – and the way in which they immediately put on me handcuffs and chains on my legs,” Dikko told the BBC a year after the incident.

At the end of the day, the Nigerian intelligence officer and the three Israelis were all convicted of the crime and sent to prison. The governments of Nigeria and Israel however denied involvement in the crime. The incident marred relations between Britain and Nigeria for two years. “The kidnap caused one of the worst-ever diplomatic crises between Britain and Nigeria,” historian Max Siollun wrote in The Independent of London in 2012. “The Nigerian high commissioner was declared persona non grata in London, and the head of Nigeria Airways narrowly escaped being arrested by British police. Diplomatic relations between Nigeria and Britain were suspended for two years.”

Dikko returned to Nigeria a decade after the incident. He later died on July 1 in London, leaving behind “two wives, 11 children and many grandchildren.”

Born in Wamba, in central Nigeria, in 1936, Dikko had studied at the University of London and worked with the BBC for some time. He was later a commissioner in the northern province of Nigeria (now Kaduna State) and the manager of the presidential campaign of his brother-in-law, Shagari.

After his abduction, he went to law school in London and was admitted to the bar. He reentered Nigerian politics in the 1990s, and before his death, he became chairman of the disciplinary committee of the People’s Democratic Party, led by President Goodluck Jonathan.

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is a Nigerian economist who, on March 3rd, 2021, was sworn in as the first woman and first African director-general of the World Trade Organization (WTO). She was also the longest serving finance minister in the government of Nigeria and has headed initiatives prioritizing the economies of low-income countries at the World Bank.

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was born on June 13, 1954 in Ogwashi-Ukwu, Delta State, Nigeria. She studied at Nigeria’s oldest girls’ secondary school and traveled to the U.S. to study at Harvard University as a teenager (1973). She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard with a bachelor’s in economics (1976) and later earned her PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1981. Since then, she has been awarded 15 honorary degrees from other institutions around the world. After receiving her doctoral degree, Okonjo-Iweala served for 25 years in the World Bank where she rose to the no. 2 position as managing director of operations. In that post she supervised development projects and portfolios in Europe, Africa, Central Asia, and South Asia.

Okonjo-Iweala made history in Nigeria after being appointed the first woman and longest serving Finance Minister of Nigeria. She was first appointed by President Olusegun Obasanjo (2003-2006) and again by President Goodluck Jonathan (2011-2015). She also served as Minister of Foreign Affairs between her two terms. During this time in government, Okonjo-Iweala sought to bring about reforms that increased fiscal transparency in government and reduced corruption by publishing government distributions to different departments and local offices on the finance ministry website and in newspapers. In 2005, she led negotiations with the Paris Club, an assembly of the world’s most developed nations, which led to the restructuring of 30 billion dollars of external debt owned by Nigeria as well as the outright cancellation of 18 billion dollars of debt. When Okonjo-Iweala was serving her second term under President Jonathan, she received death threats and suffered the kidnapping of her mother (who was later released by kidnappers). Despite this adversity, due to her reform programs and work as finance minister, Okonjo-Iweala is credited with helping grow the Nigerian economy, which has recently overtaken South Africa as the largest economy in Africa.

Okonjo-Iweala has written or co-written six books and has authored numerous works on development and finance. She has been featured on Forbes magazine’s 100 most powerful women in the world for four straight years and was recognized by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world.

Most recently, Okonjo-Iweala has been elected as the World Trade Organization’s Director General where she will be a spokesperson for the WTO and be instrumental in facilitating trade negotiations and settling disputes between member nations.

Founded on October 4, 1962, Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) is a public university located in Zaria, Kaduna State in northern Nigeria. With over 35,000 students, it is the largest university in sub-Saharan Africa and the second largest on the African continent after the University of Cairo in Egypt. The institution was originally founded as the University of Northern Nigeria but was renamed in honor of the Sardauna of Sokoto, Alhaji Sir Ahmadu Bello, who was the first premier of northern Nigeria and the university’s first chancellor. Bello was murdered by Army officers on January 15, 1966 during Nigeria’s first military coup.

The university has two main campuses, the Samaru and Kongo campus. The Samaru campus is home to the administrative offices, sciences, social sciences, arts and languages, education and research facilities. The Kongo campus houses the Faculties of Law and Administration, which consists of accounting, business administration, local government and development studies, and public administration departments. The university also has the ABU Teaching Hospital, which is one of the largest training hospitals in Nigeria.

Currently, the university covers a land area of 7,000 hectares and encompasses twelve academic faculties, a postgraduate school and 82 academic departments. It also has five institutes, six specialized centers, a Division of Agricultural Colleges, a demonstration secondary school, a primary school and extension and consultancy services, which provide a variety of services to the university and the wider society. While most students are from northern Nigeria, the university attracts students from all over Africa. There are about 1,400 academic and research staff and 5,000 support staff working at ABU.

Ahmadu Bello University has numerous notable alumni including the current vice president of Nigeria, Namadi Sambo. Its philosophy/motto is, “The first duty of every university is the search for and the spread of knowledge and the establishment of the nation.”

Nigerian student Victory Yinka-Banjo made headlines in 2020 when she scored straights As in her West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE). Weeks prior to that, she had been rated as the “Top in the World” in English as a second language (speaking endorsement) by the University of Cambridge International Examination (CIE), according to a CNN report. In the Cambridge IGCSE exam, the Nigerian teen acquired A* in all six subjects she sat for, the report added.

Today, the 17-year-old high school graduate has received 19 full-ride scholarship offers from universities across the United States and Canada. Documents cited by CNN show that Victory has been offered more than 5 million dollars worth of scholarship money for an undergraduate program of study.

“It still feels pretty unbelievable. I applied to so many schools because I didn’t even think any school would accept me,” Victory told CNN.

She received potential full scholarships from Harvard College, Yale College, Brown University and Princeton University. Other scholarship offers were from Stanford University, Johns Hopkins University, the University of Virginia, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

In Canada, she was given the Lester B. Pearson scholarship from the University of Toronto and the Karen McKellin International Leader of Tomorrow (KMILOT) scholarship from the University of British Columbia.

Victory was born to Nigerian parents. Her mother, Chika Yinka-Banjo, is a senior lecturer at the University of Lagos while her father, Adeyinka Banjo, is a private sector procurement and supply chain executive. The teenager attributes her academic triumph to parental guidance, faith and hard work. She said her scholarship offers “have made me stand taller, smile wider, and pat myself on the back more often.”

Her hope is to study Computational Biology though she is yet to choose a school. Stanford, Harvard, MIT, Duke, and Johns Hopkins are on top of her list, she said, adding that she is still doing research on them.

Victory’s parents are proud of her achievement, and they are optimistic that her story will encourage other young Nigerians to go for gold. “It is noteworthy that she is not one of the Nigerian-Americans who often get into these schools because of their advantage of being born and bred in the US. She completed her secondary school here [in Nigeria]. It would be great if her story can be used to inspire the youths of our country,” Victory’s mother, Chika, told CNN.

A photo of a Nigerian-American family has gone viral on LinkedIn after it was posted by one of them earlier this month. It was in commemoration of World Siblings day and Dr. Chinyere Okpaleke decided to share the picture of her siblings who all practice medicine.

The picture is the epitome of Black Excellence; that explains why it earned the admiration of almost 170,000 people on the professional networking platform, with about 6000 comments.

The Okpaleke is a family of nine — six girls, their brother, and parents. They are: Lillian Okpaleke, M.D., Okway Okpaleke, M.D., Chinelo Okpaleke, P.A., Nkiru Osefo, M.D., Ifeoma Okpaleke, N.P., Queenate Okpaleke, N.P. and Chinyere Okpaleke.

Their father, Andrew Okpaleke, M.D., is a retired physician of internal medicine who was in the practice for more than 30 years and their mother, Celina Okpaleke, P.A., has been in the field for over 20 years.

Their parents’ profession had an influence on them and their choice of career which they do not regret. Being immigrants from Nigeria, they made a lot of sacrifices for their families to succeed and have the right foundation to thrive. “We are Nigerian, so we have that cultural background of my parents being immigrants and basically sacrificing coming here for a better life,” Chinyere Okpaleke told Good Morning America. “Their idea of wanting us to succeed came across in how they raised us.”

Chinyere, called Dr. Chi by her patients, is a family medicine hospitalist living in Houston. She said if she had the choice of choosing between her family and that of the Kardashians, she will choose hers a million times over because she is proud of what they do; saving lives.

“If I had to choose between The Okpaleke’s Vs The Kardashian’s… I would choose US every single time.”

“I know our parents and ancestors are beyond proud! We are exactly what their sacrifices were meant for! All glory to God,” she added.

The siblings believe the photo they posted on National Siblings Day will give hope to little ones that have big dreams to pursue them. “I’ve had someone say they printed it out and they have it on their refrigerator so their children can see it as motivation,” Dr. Chi said. “It’s very touching. I’m happy that we’re able to shed some light in today’s world.”

A Nigerian-born physician who has worked in four continents — Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America — is being honored as one of the top physicians in the U.S. Professor Iyalla Elvis Peterside was named among recipients of America’s Best Physicians 2021 award by the U.S. National Consumer Advisory Board and Todaysbestphysician.com.

Professor Peterside is known for his outstanding work in Pediatrics and Neonatology at the University of Pennsylvania Medical school.

He has worked as a consultant for the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, considered one of the best children’s hospitals in the world. The decorated professor specializes in Neonatal Apnea, Neonatal Brain Injury, Neonatal ECMO, Neonatal Surgery, Nosocomial Infections, and Ventilation of the Neonate. His works have previously been recognized by professional associations in the U.S. and institutions where he has worked.

According to the children’s hospital in Philadelphia, his areas of interest are care of complex neonatal patients and infection control with emphasis on catheter-related bloodstream infections. He is an expert on the use of ECMO to treat critically ill patients in respiratory and cardiac failure.

Professor Peterside graduated from the University of Ibadan in 1985 where he had his medical training and then went on to train in pediatrics, pediatric surgery, and neonatology at the Booth Hall Children’s Hospital in Manchester, England, and The Bolton General Hospital in Bolton, England.

From there he attended the Brooklyn Medical Center in New York for further training and completed a fellowship in neonatal-perinatal medicine at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital, Nigeria.

Peterside is an Associate Professor of Clinical Pediatrics, Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and has published two papers in conjunction with other doctors in his field — “Periocular ulcerative dermatitis associated with gentamicin ointment prophylaxis in newborns” and “Pilot trial to compare tolerance of chlorhexidine gluconate to povidone-iodine antisepsis for central venous catheter placement in neonates.”

Peterside is one of the many Nigerians excelling in the U.S. Nigerians are the most highly educated of all groups in the U.S. — 61 percent hold at least a bachelors degree compared with 31 percent of the total foreign-born population and 32 percent of the U.S.-born population, according to 2017 data from the Migration Policy Institute.

The 2016 American Community Survey also found that among Nigerian-American professionals, 45 percent work in education services with several others being professors at some of the top universities. Nigerian Americans are also increasingly entering into entrepreneurship and building tech companies in the U.S. In the medical field, you will find them there too; as they continue to abandon their home country to work in American hospitals for better pay and working conditions.

Despite racism and discrimination, Nigerian-Americans have not stopped excelling in the United States, as they are currently one of the country’s most successful immigrant communities, with a median household income of $62,351, compared to $57,617 nationally, as of 2015.

The over 376,000 Nigerian-American population has also produced some of the ‘firsts’ in America, including forensic pathologist Dr Bennet Omalu, who was the first to discover and publish on chronic traumatic encephalopathy in American football players, and Pearlena Igbokwe, the first woman of African descent to head a major U.S. TV studio.

Apart from traditional careers like doctors, lawyers and engineers, Nigerian-Americans are also doing tremendously well in entertainment, sports and the culinary arts. Nigerian chef Tunde Wey in New Orleans made the news when he used food to highlight racial wealth inequality in America.

So how did Nigerians get to U.S. in their numbers, and how are they outshining citizens from their host country?

After the Biafra war in the 1960s in Nigeria, many students were given scholarships by the Nigerian government to pursue higher studies in the States. These students performed well and furthered their education before becoming professionals in their various fields. They valued education and passed this on to their children, and the result is what is being observed now.

To counter the stereotypical nature of art history, Nigerian-American artist Adebunmi Gbadebo uses Black hair from people from the African Diaspora to create her art pieces.

She feels it is about time to make art pieces rooted in the Black culture so people who look like her would find their place in art history as well.

Gbadebo chose to use Black human hair instead of traditional art materials because of the history and ancestry that is embedded in a single strand. “…And that strand connects us back to the continent, to Africa,” she told BBC.

She said she wanted all to see Black human hair as something powerful that needs to be respected, as something that should take up space in ‘traditional’ art galleries.

Her journey began in the School of Visual Arts in New York City, where she decided to use Black human hair “as a medium to depict her art on canvas”, BBC reported.

Gbadebo, born in New Jersey and based in Newark, sourced Black human hair from her local community barbershops and those in Nigeria and Morocco as well. At times, people who had heard about her quest to utilize Black human hair in her works voluntarily mail her their hair, she said.

According to her, the local barbershops and people’s homes became her art store and they trusted her enough to give a piece of their hair to her to immortalize in her art pieces.

“Dada” was the first piece Gbadebo created with hair. “I have sewn hair to canvas, and I hand sew most of my work. The needle replaces my brush and instantly, the process became more involved allowing me to pierce through surfaces to insert “nappy” hair,” she said.

“The needle also slows the process and reflects that of a hairdresser or a mother working on her child’s head that rests in between her thighs. I am looking for ways to integrate genealogies of the diaspora with critical discourse through my use of hair!” she added.

Gbadebo recently deliberately combined Black hair, cotton, rice paper, and different shades of blue for her exhibition at Claire Oliver Gallery in New York. A Dilemma of Inheritance focuses on her True Blue portraits which were inspired by the testimony of journalist and author Ta-Neshi Coates at a reparations hearing. “We recognize our lineage as a generational trust, as inheritance, and the real dilemma posed by reparations is just that: a dilemma of inheritance. It is impossible to imagine America without the inheritance of slavery.”

Coates’ words inspired Gbadebo’s exhibition. She said of the origins of the works: “As an artist, I’m confronting my relationship with the Gbadebocolor blue, Indigo, and materials cotton and rice in the context of their origins as commodities born of violence and enslavement,” said Gbadebo. “I’m interested in the whole system that produced these materials and how its memory has been treated.”

Nigerian-Jamaican photographer Nadine Ijewere, who became the first Black woman to ever shoot a Vogue cover in the magazine’s 125-year history, is raking in more firsts with the iconic fashion spread.

In 2018, the then 26-year-old shot for Dua Lipa for the cover of British Vogue, and three years down the line, she has become the first Black woman to shoot a cover image for American Vogue.

The London-based photographer, who has shot spreads for the magazine in the past, photographed the sensational Selena Gomez for American Vogue’s April cover. She has become a beacon of hope for many Black girls who will not be forced to follow supposed norms. “As a young Black woman, I didn’t imagine that I would one day have the opportunity to shoot a cover for American Vogue,” Ijewere wrote in a post on her Instagram.

Ijewere shared the spotlight with the fashion editor for the April 2021 issue, Gabriella Kafera-Johnson, who became the first Black woman to ever style a Vogue cover on the January 2021 issue. The two gushed about their collaboration and encouraged Black women to own their space in the fashion industry.

“I’m so honored to have been able to work with my fellow sister Gabriella Karefa-Johnson. I hope this encourages Black women that there is space for us to take in this industry,” Ijewere said.

The Nigerian-Jamaican woman has been interested in fashion imagery since she was a girl. After studying photography at the London College of Fashion, she began to focus her work primarily on the subjects of identity and diversity, informed by her Nigerian-Jamaican background.

“My work is all about the celebration of diversity without creating a representation – particularly for women, as we are the ones who are more exposed to beauty ideals and to not being comfortable in who we are,” she was quoted by the British Journal of Photography recently.

According to The Cut, the fashion industry revolves around women, and yet most decision-makers, designers, and executives in most fashion houses right down to stylists, photographers, and those who work behind the scenes are men.

Injewere hinted at the lack of diversity during a 2018 interview with British Vogue when she became the first Black woman to shoot for the magazine.

“I feel like in doing this I’m proving to younger girls from a similar background that it’s achievable,” she said. “It also feels like part of a broader shift within our culture to include far more diversity, both behind the camera and in front of it.”

Flutterwave was not the first of its kind in Africa when it was started in 2016 by Nigerian technologists and former bankers. But perhaps, the point of its success can be attributed to the fact it was a financial tech platform that had a lot of input from those in finance.

Often, the process of technological innovation can seem like a developer’s license to play to the gallery. The app or whatever is developed could therefore lose its ergonomic utility. Flutterwave turned out differently and by 2018, it was a market leader in sub-Saharan Africa.

A digital payment app known for being seamless and secure, Flutterwave continues to be the choice for small to medium-scale enterprises (SMEs).

Founder and CEO, Olugbenga Agboola said via social media that plan was always to “build a payments technology infrastructure that connects Africa to the global economy by making local and international payments seamless.”

Flutterwave’s website says the app is available in 11 countries, however, it will soon be 20. This is thanks to a Series C funding that was announced on Wednesday to much funfair in Nigeria and across Africa.

The $170 million secured means in the third round of funding means that the fintech start-up is now a unicorn – a startup worth over $1 billion. This is the first time an indigenous African fintech is valued at that amount.

“We’re grateful for our People, Customers, Investors, Partners, Regulators, the people at @EndeavorNigeria and well-wishers. Through your support, we have empowered millions to start their journey to economic freedom, wherever they are, knowing that the world is their market,” Agboola continued in a series of tweets.

But signs show that this could only be the beginning of a lot of good for Flutterwave. Currently, the app hosts more than 1,000 African SMEs that sell their wares on the platform.

Apart from that, individual users of Flutterwave are in their hundreds of thousands but growing. There are now intentions to expand the company’s services to North Africa as well.

Victor Asemota, a Nigerian venture capitalist, believes the success of Flutterwaves will have a positive impact on other tech start-ups across the continent.

“The panic this Flutterwave raise had created in certainly [sic] circles means that Africa was severely underrated both externally and internally. Look, we have done Telco payments all over Africa and this is the tip of the iceberg. Flutterwave will list [sic] and be a greater success,” Asemota said via Twitter.

Nigerian teenager Faith Odunsi is putting the West African nation on the map after winning the Global Open Mathematics competition. She beat other contestants from Africa, Europe, Asia, Australia, and the United States to emerge the winner with 40 points, with the second runner tailing her with 10 points.

Odunsi, as the winner, walked away with $1000 which will be presented in an official ceremony soon. The 15-year-old is a final year high school student at the Ambassadors School, Ota Ogun State whose father is a medical doctor and mother, a businesswoman. Her parents are extremely proud of her win and she claims to have gotten her mathematics genes from her father.

According to her, the first stage of the tournament was the most difficult because she was not accustomed to the computer-based test. She scored 66 points in both the first and second rounds which were all CBT then progressed to the quarter and semi-finals held on Microsoft teams, acing that round as well.

Throughout the tournament, Odunsi said she did not think herself a winner till she answered more questions correctly in the final round. “My heart raced but I felt relieved,” she told The Punch.

Odunsi did not want her preparations for the tournament to interfere with that of her regular classes. “It takes a village to train a child” is not just an African proverb but a concept that works. The high schooler prepared for the competition with the help of her teacher. He coached her after regular classes ended.

When the competition date got closer, she had to dedicate more time to get ready sometimes studying at night from 11 pm to midnight.

The Global Open Mathematics competition is just one of many competitions the young genius has participated in. She has been participating in the national Olympiad since she was in junior high school, among others.

“I have also taken part in Kangourou Sans Frontieres, South African mathematics Olympiad, American Mathematics Competition, and Pan-African mathematics Olympiad. For the national Olympiad, I was made the Queen of Mathematics from JSS3 to SS2.

“For the South African Mathematics Olympiad, I got medals. I got a silver medal in the Pan-African mathematics Olympiad in 2019. I was also made an ambassador of my school.”

Again in 2019, she set a record in the Cowbellpedia competition answering 19 questions in seconds.

The Ambassadors School invests in its students who take part in competitions. For instance, the school holds extra classes for all participants preparing for competitions. Students are generally trained to solve mathematical questions mentally with little to no errors.

The young achiever wants to pursue a degree in Computer Engineering abroad because she believes there will be enough structures in place there to enhance the learning experience.

Many young girls tend to shy away from mathematics but not Odunsi. She said mathematics is her favorite subject although she has an interest in information and communications technology. She explained that math is all about getting the concept and applying the formula when solving other questions. In her words, “it is about using your brains and basic logical reasoning.”

Odunsi is still a teenager who loves to do other things aside from studying and winning competitions. She said academic work by no means affects her social skills and she is into sports as well.

People who draw on their own experiences to make the world a better place for others are invaluable and Dr. Oluwatomilayo (Tito) Daodu is a poster girl for such people. She had a rough childhood and as the first Black female pediatric surgeon practicing in Canada at the Alberta’s Children’s Hospital Foundation, she wants to make surgical care accessible to all.

Daodu is an award-winning researcher, volunteer, and the first Black pediatric surgeon working to “break down barriers to patients in need of surgical care.”

She believes her job is the best in the world as she does not only get to save lives but save the lifetimes of children she encounters.

As part of Black History Month, the American Pediatric Surgical Association (APSA) gave a nod to the remarkable work Daodu is doing in her field on Twitter.

According to Avenue Calgary, Daodu was born in Nigeria. After being deported from Canada, she permanently moved to the country when she was eight. Fortunately, or unfortunately, she grew up in a rough neighborhood in the inner city of Winnipeg.

Determined to be more than she sees around her, Daodu chose to make the local drop-in center for kids, Wes Broadway Youth Outreach, her second home. There she was mentored by volunteers, and to date, she credits them for changing her life.

It was then that she took a stance to do everything she could to help the less privileged in society because when they get help, they, in turn, might grow up to reciprocate that help and the entire cycle is broken for a better society.

To her, the world would be a better place when pediatric surgeons are accessible to all peoples everywhere. “When we help the worst off or those with the least access, we do a service to the entire system,” she said.

She received her medical training at the University of Manitoba and did her residency and fellowship at the University of Calgary. Her research was on the impact of socioeconomic status on surgical outcomes and access to care.

For her outstanding work to society, she was nominated as part of Avenue Magazine’s Top 40 Under 40 in October 2019. The award scheme recognizes high-achieving Calgarians who are doing their bid to effect change in society and creating a lasting impact on the future of others.

As a medical student, Daodu was part of a team that developed a project centered on adolescent gender and reproductive health in Tanzania.

There were no summer ‘holidays’ for her either because she spent her summers in her native country Nigeria researching early childhood pneumonia and later launched ‘a surgical needs assessment’ for Nigeria as well.

Currently, Daodu is pursuing a master’s in public health at the Harvard University’s T.H Chan School of Public health. At Harvard, Daodu is part of a team working to modify the safe surgery checklist for high-income countries around the world, per Avenue Calgary.

Her passion is to promote justice and equity in medicine through Global Health. She is participating in ongoing research on Global and Public Health that focuses on improving surgical outcomes and improving equal access to surgical care for Canadians and the world at large.

“One of the things that excite me about the future is that I have a story that not that many people have,” she said. “I am probably uniquely situated from what I’ve gone through in life to be able to speak not just from an academic point of view, but from real life.”