By Lateef Adegbite
Barely 15 years after Tony Elumelu a multi-billionaire business mogul, Chairman of United Bank for African, UBA, popular Pan African Bank, and Chairman of other, TEF, blue-chip companies in Nigerian landscape founded, Tony Elumelu Foundation, TEF, to empower Nigerians and other African countries young entrepreneurs, he has every reason to be happy. This is because the young African entrepreneurs who are being closely monitored doing well in respective areas of business.
The Foundation which was said to have started with the initial disbursement and empowering of the young entrepreneurs from Nigeria and other African countries with the sum of the North American country of the United States $100 million was said to have lifted over two million Africans from poverty level since 2010.
The Financial empowerment of the over 2.5 million young entrepreneurs with access to training on TEF Connect to benefit from the initial startup investment of US, $100 million in any business idea approved by the selecting Committee , according to a top official of the Foundation have so far created over 1.5 million direct and indirect jobs in Nigeria, Uganda and other African countries as the entrepreneurs were said to have generated over $4.2 billion to the African economy.
Many believes that if other notable Foundations in the African Continent could have followed the foot step of Tony Elumelu Foundation to support and empower young African entrepreneurs the problem of unemployment would have been reduced considerably in the African continent.
The empowerment drive of the young African entrepreneurs , financial analysts had said would have also discouraged the young Africans besieging the Embassies of the US, Canada, United Kingdom, UK, France and other European countries including the United Arab Emirate, UAE, from going to seek for VISAs to jet out of their home countries in search of greener pastures.
The TEF, Authorities may have spoken out the success of the Foundation in the 10 initial disbursement that had been made between 2010 and now as it is set to make another round of disbursement, which is the 11th cohort of the TEF Entrepreneurship programme on Saturday, March 22, 2025.
A beneficiary of the TEF, empowerment and financial support, programme who is doing well in his own line of business in Nigeria, had said that the announcement of the young African entrepreneurs is coming at a critical time as Africa’s entrepreneurship systems currently faces funding constrains, worsened by the global economic headwinds.
Notwithstanding the downturn in the global economy, an elated Elumelu, may have gladdened the heart of the young Nigerians and other African young entrepreneurs when he disclosed recently that he had founded the multi-billion dollars Foundation to empower young entrepreneurs, stating that he will continue ‘’to provide the much-needed support and empowering of the young African entrepreneurs to transform their ideas in sustainable areas of businesses of economic growth in their respective countries.
This time around, the lucky TEF, beneficiaries are expected to receive the sum of US $5,000, non-refundable capital, a world-business training on TEF Connect, one-on-one mentorship and access to global networks and investment opportunities.
An insider had confirmed that the selection process has nothing to do with staff of the Foundation. The selection process, according to the source, is being conducted by Messr Enst & Young, to ensure unbiased assessment.
Financial analysts believes that Elumelu, the multi-billionaire investor, had sustained TEF, all these past years and now, because of his believe in’’ changing lives and shaping Africa’s future economy’’.
There is no gain saying the fact that the impact of the TEF funding of the young African entrepreneurs over the years as witnessed by beneficiaries of the Foundation Entrepreneurship programme bear eloquent testimony to the opening of the African economy by the small and medium scale Enterprises, SMEs opened by the young entrepreneurs.
Ahead of the upcoming announcement of the selected beneficiaries of the TEF, empowerment and financial support programme, the UBA, Chairman, and who incidentally is the Chairman of Heirs Holdings, had told those that cares to listen of his’’ unwavering belief in the potential of the Africa’s entrepreneurs’’.
He hs his reason for the unshakable belief on the potentials of the young African entrepreneurs. According to him, ‘’Africa’s transformation will not come by Aid from the World Bank/ International Monetary Fund, IMF and other multilateral financial institutions or the developed economies like US, UK, Canada, France or the Asian country of China, but by empowering the next generation of African entrepreneurs.
He noted that the African entrepreneurs needed to be given the necessary working tools, funding, training and the networks ‘’to build sustainable businesses that create job opportunities for the teeming unemployed youths to drive African economic growth’’.
The multi-billionaire investor who could not hide his feelings had stated that over the past decade, the Foundation, founded by him, had nurtured entrepreneurs from inception to success, describing the philanthropic Organization impact across the 54 countries in the African Continent as impressive.
‘’We have provided capital and also developed robust monitoring valuation framework that allows the staff of the Foundation to track the progress of the empowered African entrepreneurs and ensure their contributions to their communities and local economies’’, he had said.
The Delta state born multi-billionaire business mogul, could beat is chest that no other Organization is implementing indentureship development at this large scale in the African Continent as much as TEF. ‘’We have learned, we have refined, and we will continue to improve on the Foundation empowerment programme by ensuring that African entrepreneurs, both men and women are at forefront of solving the Continent’s economic challenges and creating wealth for themselves and their communities’’, he had remarked.
He was said to have repeatedly said that ‘’entrepreneurship is the key to Africa’s prosperity’’. He may have taken advantage of the success that had been achieved by the previous beneficiaries of the Foundation empowerment and financial support to put their business idea into practice become to wish the 2025 cohort entrepreneurs’ success as they pursue their life ambitions of starting an enduring business and employers of Labour to play a part in the Africa’s economic transformation.
He was emphatic that with the TEF, funding, training and mentorship of the young African entrepreneurs’’ the Foundation will not only provide them with the much-needed capital to start the business but also the confidence and skills to build a business that is outstanding and attract other investors, both local and foreign to it, to beef up their capital base.
Determined to ensure that the young African entrepreneurs succeed in their business drive, without being sabotaged by power problem, may have informed why the business mogul has commercialized his clean energy innovation project by making available the solar energy solutions to them to power their plants.
The Nigerian born multi-billionaire business mogul was said to distributed to the solar energy solution to over 50,00 homes in Rural Tanzania, where Juma Nyerere , is the Renewable Energy Entrepreneur.
This is just one, out of the many cases of the young African entrepreneurs empowered by TEF, in the East African Continent making waves. There are several others in Nigeria, Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya, making appreciable impacts to their countries economies. Vintage Elumelu
