Managing Director/CEO, UBA Foundation, Ms
Ijeoma Aso; Deputy CEO, UBA Africa, Mr. Emeke
Iweriebor; Director, Marketing and Corporate
Relations, UBA Africa, Mrs Bola Atta, with
students of secondary schools, during the launch
of the 2015 edition of National Essay
Competition for Senior Secondary School students
in Nigeria, organised by UBA Foundation, held at
UBA House in Lagos
UBA Foundation, the corporate social
responsibility arm of United Bank for Africa (UBA)
Plc, has announced the opening of entries for the
2015 edition of its annual National Essay
Competition.
Ijeoma Aso, the Managing Director/CEO of UBA
Foundation, at a media briefing held at the UBA
Head Office in Lagos, on Wednesday, September
30, 2015, announced that the Foundation will
start receiving entries from eligible participants in
senior secondary schools in Nigeria.
The briefing was attended by students from
different secondary schools in Lagos.
Entries for the essay competition opens on
September 30, 2015 and will close on November
13, 2015. The essay topic for this year is “
What matters most to you in life and why”.
Speaking during the media briefing, Ms Aso, said
the essay competition provides an opportunity for
students in senior secondary schools in Nigeria to
win prizes in the form of educational grants.
The first prize for the UBA National Essay
Competition is a N1 million educational grant for
the winner to study in any African university of
his or her choice. The second and third prizes are
N750,000 and N500,000 educational grants
respectively.
Ms Aso explained that the competition is part of
the Foundation's initiative to promote creative
and analytical thinking in senior secondary
students in Nigeria and is a follow up on the
Foundation’s Read Africa initiative, which
promotes reading culture among students
through the reading and free distribution of Africa
literary classics in secondary schools. The
national essay competition is also held in Ghana
and Senegal.
Entries received for the competition will be
reviewed by a distinguished panel of judges made
up of professors from reputable Nigerian
Universities, who will then shortlist 12 best
essays for further assessment.
A second round of the competition will involve the
12 finalist who will write a second supervised
essay from which three best essays will be
selected.
“ Three best essays will be selected as the overall
winners from 12 finalists that will emerge from
the first round of the competition.” Said Ijeoma
Aso, Managing Director/CEO, UBA Foundation.
The top three winners of the competition win
educational grants to study in any African
university of their choice.
The Group Managing Director and CEO, UBA Plc,
Mr. Phillips Oduoza, represented by Mr. Emeke
Iweriebor, Deputy CEO, UBA Africa, said the
essay competition is UBA’s modest contribution
to educational development in Nigeria and across
Africa.
“As a pan-African financial services group with
operations in 22 countries, we aim to impact on
the countries we do operate in through the three
main anchors of education, environment and
social empowerment.”
He urged students to take the national essay
competition seriously as it provides a massive
opportunity for them to change their lives for the
better. He also dared students to dream big and
read and write extensively.
“Great leaders are people who read. They read
everything that they come across. They have a
curious mind so they study hard” Mr. Iweriebor
said.
Also speaking at the media briefing, Bola Atta,
Director- UBA Africa, Marketing and Corporate
Communications, urged students to see the
national essay competition as a opportunity to lay
a foundation for success in the future.
“You have an amazing world ahead of you. You
can be all that you want to be. By reading, you
get ideas and you can imagine whatever you want
to be. The mind has a way of channeling your
energy into whatever you want to become in
future” she said.
Atta also urged the students to read far and wide
and that no information gained from reading is
ever wasted.
As the Corporate Social Responsibility arm of the
UBA Group, UBA Foundation is committed to the
socio-economic betterment of the communities in
which UBA operates, focusing on development in
the areas of Environment, Education, Economic
Empowerment and Special Projects.
UBA foundation remains a role model for other
corporate organizations in Africa. The Foundation
has dedicated resources to ensuring that CSR is
not simply conceived as a marketing tool in the
corporate world but as a corporate contribution
towards promoting sustainable development in
communities.
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