Youth
A group, Boys Champions (BC), says it will sponsor 10 Nigerian boys to attend the United Nations (UN) Youths Assembly in New York in August, 2023.
The founder of BC, Noel Alumona, disclosed this while speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Enugu.
Alumona, who described BC as a non-profit organization, said he created the group to train and support young boys towards the process of ending violence against women and girls in Nigeria.
He explained that the travel would be an opportunity for the 10 boys to engage in intercultural exchange experiences at the UN.
“Some of the partner organisations we work with, like American Field Services (AFS) intercultural Programme in New York, decided to give us five slots of these young boys to attend UN Youth Assembly in August.
“We decide to add the extra five so while BC sponsoring five, AFS is sponsoring five free of charge.
“In the past four years, we have had 5,300 young boys across the country enrolling into our programme, and from which we selected the boys for the UN programme,” he said.
Alumona, who is the UN award-winning Nigerian for 2022 AFS Award for Young Global Citizens, added that BC is targeting to empower 50,000 young boys in next five years across the country on different skills.
“Our target at BC is to reach out to 50,000 youths, by providing study scholarship, mentorship session, skills acquisition, and reorientation programmes for deviant behaviours, as well as logistic support for volunteers during field work,” he said.
While calling on organisations to support BC, the 30-year-old Alumona said he had been supporting the group from proceeds from his companies as well as funding from few organisations.
According to him, part of internally generated revenue from his company is what they using to run the project as part of its corporate social responsibility.
Explaining why he chose only boys, the founder said, “It is because a lot of attention had been paid to girls and women in form of empowerment over the time, leaving men and boys behind.
“We are beginning to see the discrepancies which have resulted in negative effect on boys and, in years to come, if not checked it may be a big issue.
“The young boys are now becoming part of the process of ending violence against women, with them supporting girls”.
Alumona, while thanking the Minister of Women Affairs, Dr Pauline Tallen, for decorating him recently as an Ambassador for “He For She” by UN women, said all must be involved to end violence against women in Nigeria.
He, however, called on young people to participate in the process of electing their leaders to make those meaningful changes they desired.
“What I told leaders few weeks ago at the UN is that they should utilize the smartness of this young people in their decision making.
“As for us in BC, we will continue to bridge the knowledge gap, by raising young leaders who are socially responsible,” Alumona said. (NAN)
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Tags: Boys Champions Noel Alumona Pauline Tallen
