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Oak Nation Entrepreneurial (ONE) Foundation hosted the African Changemaker Dialogue (ACD) 2021 by bringing leading changemakers who run social enterprises and nonprofits from eight countries across Africa.

Social enterprise leaders from Nigeria, Cameroon, Guinea, and Uganda led the conversations which were to discuss the pertinent issues facing the ability to lead social change on the continent.

The dialogue, which was moderated by Mayowa Tijani, a Nigerian journalist,  was themed “Leading social change in uncertain times”.

The panelists include Annet Lukuru, a civil-society leader building strong democratic and nonviolent communities in Uganda; Luxwell Jokonya, who leads a health organization helping hundreds of babies with neurological conditions access lifesaving surgeries in Zimbabwe; Jacqueline Fonkwo, who is advocating adolescent health care in Cameroon; and Chisom Nwankwo creating sustain integration plan for internally displaced persons in Nigeria.

Luxwell Jokonya sharing insights about his change-making work in Zimbabwe

The social leaders discussed the impact of COVID-19 and nonprofit leadership in Africa and agreed that there is an urgency — more than ever before — for nonprofit leaders to develop alternative funding strategies to lead sustainable social change in Africa.

Nwankwo, while addressing the issue of shrinking funding, said: “If people are offering to fund our organization, it’s great, it’s excellent but we as Africans should begin to look for ways to solve our problems ourselves in order to stay sustainable in the long run”

Lekuru highlighted collaboration as a way to offer the problem of the shrinking donor space, while also emphasising volunteering as an alternative to funding. 

Oluwatoyin Ajilore, the executive director of ONE foundation, further reiterated the need to imbibe volunteering into our culture and the formal education system.

Ajilore also shared some details about the volunteer model adopted by the ONE Foundation over the last three years.

A cross-section of participants

The event doubled as the graduation ceremony of the second cohort of the Emerging Social Leadership (ESL) program of the Oak Nation Entrepreneurial (ONE) Academy.

ESL is an executive education program that equips visionaries in the social sector with the required knowledge, skills resources, and networks needed to create sustainable social change

ONE Foundation also hosts other courses in its academy including the Basic Entrepreneurial Program and the Intermediate Entrepreneurial programs for entrepreneurs amidst other programs of the organization.

Learn more about ONE Foundation here.