A Senior Secondary II student, Naomi Osemeeghonghon Odiboh has emerged The Voice Achievers Award Ambassador.
The student of Supreme Educational Foundation, Magodo-Lagos was recently conferred with the honour by the CEO of The Voice Achievers Award, Ambassador Elvis Iruh during the event witnessed by local and international audience, at the Eko Hotels and Suites, Victoria Island, Lagos. It was a gathering of the crème de la crème of the business and diplomatic world in Africa and Europe.
In her speech titled “Africa Deserves Better” and read on the stage, Naomi stated that it is impossible to deny that Africa deserves more and better. According to her, the continent’s struggles today are not because Africans lack potential, but because colonialism left deep wounds that still shape our realities.
For the continent to move forward, she said’ We must first acknowledge the history that held Africa back and still struggling which included colonial exploitation which drained resources and left artificial borders, broken economies and divided nations. Others she said included suppressed education and skills for Africans, preventing the development of a strong professional and technical class with its effects still being felt’.
The award ambassador, however, insisted that, although colonialism left scars, ‘let’s be honest with ourselves, that is not why Africa is still struggling today. At some point, she noted, the blame stops being history and starts being us’.
According to her, for centuries, Africa has been called rich — rich in gold, oil, diamonds and fertile soil — yet too often, the richness has not reflected in the lives of Africans and the continent remains a land of promise but also of paradox. ‘We are wealthy yet our wealth slips through fingers. Africa is rich in resources but poor in profit because raw materials leave and wealth doesn’t return, we are vast yet our voices remain small on the global stage as Africa’s voice is often heard but not listened to in global politics and economies’, Naomi said.
She told the audience that independence came with broken systems and borrowed dreams but ‘we cannot blame the past alone’, noting that Africa still struggles because of internal wounds, corruption that eats the roots of progress, leadership that too often serves self before service and economies that export raw materials only to import finished products at 10 times the price in a continent so full of brilliance but still begs for what it already owns.
Naomi, however, provided a ray of hope saying that ‘the youths, the heartbeat of this continent will not wait for handouts because they are coding apps in Lagos, building startups in Nairobi, producing art in Johannesburg and crafting policy ideas in Accra but needed systems that believe in them, governments that invest in them and nations that unite behind them and until we wake, until we rise with the fury of all who came before us, Africa will bleed while we pretend it’s not our neglect’.
She further said that Africa’s struggles are not only because of colonial chains, but ‘they linger because we let them define us and until we stop excusing ourselves and face our own hand in the mess, Africa will bleed, not just from the world’s cruelty, but from our own betrayal’. Africa, she said, adding that her children are the proof that she will have it.
Naomi is a consummate artiste — a violinist, dramatist, dancer, singer, composer, essayist, poet, writer and a spoken word artist, among others. She is a strong Christian and loves creativity, very serious with her education and wants to study Psychotherapy otherwise known as Talk Therapy, at the university.
The Voice of Achievers Award, sponsored by The Voice magazine, based in Almere, The Netherlands; and The Embassy of The Netherlands, was the 14th edition but held for the first time in Nigeria. Previous editions of the awards were held in The Netherlands, Kenya, The Gambia and the United Arab Emirates.
According to Iruh, the next edition of the is slated for the United Kingdom in 2026.
