Speakers

A bio of our seasoned speakers

Keynote Speaker

Sen. Ajibola Bashiru

Senator Surajudeen Ajibola Basiru (Ph.D), born July 1, 1972 was a former Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice for Osun State in Nigeria. He also served as Commissioner in the Ministry of Regional Integration & Special Duties from August 2010 – November 2014. He was once a Lecturer in Osun State University November, 2014 – May 2017.

Dr. Surajudeen Ajibola Basiru, is the Senator representing Osun Central Senatorial District under the platform of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) ; and was appointed the Chairman Senate Committee on Diaspora, Non-Governmental Organizations and Civil Societies, also he was later meritoriously appointed as the Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs (Senate Spokesperson) due to his intellectualism and proactiveness.
He’s also a member of the Committee on Airforce, Committee on Downstream Petroleum Sector, Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters; and Committee on Petroleum Resources (Upstream).

Guest Speaker

Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin

A BRIEF PROFILE: Abdulmumin Jibrin is a 45 years old business man, academic, politician and Public finance expert. He was a member of the House of Representatives (APC KiruBebeji Kano) and was at various time chairman House Committee on Transport, Finance and Appropriations with oversights on Nigeria’s national income and expenditure over a period of 10years. He was Executive Director Business Development at the Federal Housing Authority overseeing construction, property management, quality control, pre projects, housing program and public- private partnership units.

An astute politician and consumate mobiliser, Abdulmumin lead two successful speakership campaign in 2015 and 2019 respectively. In addition, he was the Director Media and Stratergic Communication of the Women and Youth Presidential Campaign Team and currently Director General Bola Ahmed Tinubu Support Groups Management Council SGMC.

He holds a BSc, MSc and PhD from UniAbuja(1999) and ABU Zaria respectively majoring in politics, diplomacy, business and political economy. He holds a PLD, SEP and MBA from Harvard, London Business school and SBS-Swiss Business School Zurich, Switzerland. He is an Alumni of the Havard, London and Swiss busine..

Panelists

Maryam Laushi

Communication Specialist

Maryam Laushi is a communications specialist with special focus on new media and overall strategy in communication and media relations. She is also an advocate for youth inclusion and development, as well as one of the most vocal voices raising awareness on gender equality, social justice and youth inclusion in politics in Northern Nigeria. This, she has done through writing, trainings projects on advocacy for women and as a pioneer member of the Not Too Young To Run movement.

Her principled activism has generated debate & dialogue about numerous social issues and has attracted national attention. She volunteers for the non-profit, Youth Initiative for Advocacy, Growth and Advancement (YIAGA) and other causes. Maryam holds degrees in Communications, Advertising and Marketing from Coventry University in England and TBS in France. In 2017, she emerged successful as one of the awardees of the SME100 Nigeria’s 25 under 25 award for Active Citizenry and received the Under30s CEO award for politics and governance in 2018. In 2019, she was selected as a fellow of the Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum, for whom she regularly participates in social and political analysis and discussions.

Leo Babarinde Akinola Dasilva popularly known as Leo Dasilva is a young C.E.O of a number of companies. He is the MD/CEO of Big Figure Small World Limited and L.I.C LTD. At the age of 17, he founded SODZ Entertainment in England. He later replicated the same company in the United States.
Leo is an electronics and communications engineer. He finished his double major degree at the University of Hertfordshire United Kingdom.

Leo’s first business interest was in the entertainment sector. He launched and solely funded his first company ‘SODZ Entertainment’ in England on May 28th, 2010. He later expanded it to the United States. The company in the United States has expanded into being a booking company for every International artist and hosting music festivals in Minnesota USA. In 2012, he started another company in the UK – Big Figure Small World Limited, In October 2015 he launched the company in Nigeria. He has interests in diverse fields which led him to work briefly with Powerview Group in real estate development, logistics and Gas.

He went into the Big brother house in 2018 portraying himself as a businessman that he is and Nigerians and Africans loved him for it. He is a public speaker mostly on things he is passionate about like education, gender equality, real estate, empowerment and policymaking. His work with UN women got him commendation from the United Nations Women in 2021.

Leo Da Silva

MD/CEO Big Figure Small World LTD

Theresa Tekenah

Publicity Secretary, Progressive Young Women Forum, Publisher - tekenah.com

Tekenah is committed to youth engagement and participation in politics and has served in various capacities within the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Hamzat Lawal

CEO Connected Development

Hamzat Lawal is an activist who has successfully led grassroots campaigns in over 40 African countries with over 15 years experience in the non-profit sector and specializes in practical issues associated with Climate Change, Open Data, advocacy campaigns and development policies as it affects rural and deprived grassroots communities.

He is also the Founder of Follow The Money, the largest Pan-African grassroots data-driven movement and leads a team of technology and innovation-driven campaigners to amplify the voices of marginalized grassroots communities in promoting accountability as it affects utilization of public funds focusing on specific communities across Africa. His Follow The Money initiative emerged winner of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Mobilizer 2019 Award, at the Bonn SDG Global Festival of Action, Germany.

Maryam Shettima (famously known as Maryam Shetty) is a Political and Social Activist, a qualified physiotherapist; and social entrepreneur. She obtained her Masters Degree from East London
University, Stratford in the United Kingdom where she majored on sports physiotherapy. She was on
the medical team of the London Olympics where she worked with top-tier athletes including world record holder, Jamaica’s Usain Bolt.
Maryam also obtained a certificate and became a practitioner of Kingian Non Violence, inspired by
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. from Emory University in the United States. She also bags a Public Policy
Challenges of the 21st Century Certificate from University of Virginia.
She has extensive experience working both within the clinical and international development sector
having previously worked with the UKAid funded programme – PATHS 2, the State House Clinic at the
Presidential Villa and the Child Care and Wellness.

Maryam is known for philanthropic initiatives especially in the area of education where she led the
rehabilitation of schools in her native state of Kano on the successful platform of #GivingBack
initiative.

Dr. Maryam Shettima Ibrahim

Political and Social Activist

Babajide Akeredolu

Director General PPIMU Ondo State

Babajide Akeredolu is a Chemical & Mining Engineer, a public policy enthusiast, strategic communications expert, a member of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers ( AiChe), a life time member of Omega Chi Epsilon Chemical Engineering Honours Society and a member of Phi Beta Sigma and a member of Tau Beta Pi engineering honours society.

Babajide Studied Chemical Engineering with minors in Business and Environmental Engineering at the New Jersey Institute of Technology where he was elected President of the African Student Association. During this time, he facilitated the creation of the CONNECT Network, a hub aimed at fostering collaboration amongst students of African descent in conjunction with eight other African Students associations in New Jersey. This will not be his only position as he went on to serve in several other elected positions at NJIT one of which was Chairperson Academic Excellence and Telecommunications of the reputable National Society of Black Engineers of the school’s chapter and went ahead to become the Telecommunications Chairperson of the region comprising of all STEM universities in North-eastern USA, Eastern Canada, and West Africa. A passionate creative, he was the University’s head photographer and led the team of photographers of his campus newspaper.

He moved on to bag a masters’ degree in chemical engineering and petroleum refining at the prestigious Colorado School of Mines where he co-authored multiple peer-reviewed research papers in international journals including..