Ghanaian, 4 Nigerians receive AIG scholarships

One Ghanaian and four Nigerians have won the 2019/20 Africa Initiative for Governance (AIG) Scholarships.

The latest AIG Scholarship recipients are Kwame Sarpong of Ghana, and Babafemi Adebola, Onyekachukwu Erobu, Nasir Mohammed and Hakeem Onasanya, all of Nigeria.

The five are the recipients of the third round of the scholarship that affords its recipients a study opportunity abroad.

Each year since 2017, AIG has awarded fully funded scholarships to young outstanding West Africans from all backgrounds who are passionate about the public sector to pursue Master of Public Policy (MPP) programme at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford.

After their study at Oxford, the AIG Scholars are expected to return to their home countries and apply their learning experiences as change agents in their country’s public sector.

“I am very impressed with our third cohort of AIG Scholars,” the Founder and Chairman of AIG, Mr Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede, said.

“All five of them represent West Africans of great potential. Three qualities are common to all of them — strong intellectual ability, leadership and a passion for public service.

It takes a strong value system to want to serve the public good, and these five individuals have demonstrated a compelling desire to do so,” he added.

Partnership

In June 2016, AIG signed a five-year partnership with the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford based on a shared vision of improving the world through good governance and public leadership.  

“AIG Scholars are selected through a rigorous, transparent and merit-based process,” said Ms Chienye Ogwo, Chief Executive Officer of AIG.

“Through this process, AIG seeks to encourage the same values in the next generation of public service leaders.

 With a third round of scholars, we are honoured to contribute to the development of talent critical to support Africa’s future,” she added.

“I felt an overwhelming sense of joy and relief to have met the exceptionally high standards set by AIG for the prestigious scholarship,” Mr Nasir Mohammed, a mechanical engineering graduate of King’s College, London, and one of the recipients of the 2019 AIG Scholarships, said.

He added that “being selected as an AIG Scholar is a vote of confidence in my latent abilities which I intend to nurture during my time at the Blavatnik School in preparation for my contribution to public service.

I intend to use this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to develop myself, both personally and professionally”.

“The AIG Scholarship is a stamp of recognition of my academic abilities and leadership potential which not only humbles me, but also spurs me to do more for the benefit of humanity,” one of the beneficiaries, Mr Sarpong who holds degrees in administration and law, said.

“After the MPP, I will to return to Ghana and apply my enhanced skillset to help shape the implementation of trade policy,” he added.

AIG has opened the application window for the 2020/2021 AIG Scholarships between Wednesday, July 31 and Monday, September 23, 2019.