Bidemi Zakariyau, 27
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize for Media Enterprise
Bidemi Zakariyau is the brightest star in a saturated galaxy of public relations and media entrepreneurs. Through her boutique public relations brand, LSF PR, Zakariyau has built an international clientele that cuts across consumer markets and industries and includes Cointreau Africa, Laurent Perrier, Jack Daniels, Remy Martin, Hugo Boss, Ventures Platform. Running a bespoke service that tailors PR and brand management services to match each client’s specific needs and tailor them to Nigeria’s unpredictable socio-economic climate, LSF PR communicates, subtly but effectively. Zakariyau understands not every brand is multi-million dollar franchise and has created LSF|SME to focus exclusively on small brands and emerging talents seeking guidance and representation in a volatile ecosystem. Zakariyau marries old world values with cutting edge technology, the result a world class service always at the cutting edge.
Asuquo Ekpenyong, 31
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize in Public Service
A state commissioner for finance seems like the pinnacle of career in public service but it seems thirty one year old Asuquo Ekpenyong is only getting started. Ekpenyong already has professional expertise as an academic, lecturing at the Banking and Finance Department of the University of Calabar, invaluable field experience as a financial analyst in Lagos. He also enjoyed stints as the Managing Director of Iquasu Ventures Ltd and Chamley Bureau de Change Ltd and a run as the Executive Director for finance at Pearland Energy and Non-Executive Director at Ekondo Microfinance Bank Ltd. This confluence of real world experience and theoretical knowledge is what he brings to governance and policy making at Cross Rivers highest financial office in one of the country’s most trying economic epochs.
Adenrele Sonariwo, 30
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize for Arts & Culture 2016
Before 2016, at no time in history was a visual art exhibtion ever held in Nigeria’s seat of power, The Presidency. Adenrele Sonariwo made and broke that record, transforming President Muhammed Buhari’s halls into a cavalcade of Nigeria’s trailblazing visual art talent. A former accountant, who worked in PriceWaterHouseCoopers for over half a decade in the U.S.A, she is the founder of contemporary art space, Rele Gallery. Through her work, she is building a new generation and market of art enthusiasts, collectors, followers for visual art. The gallery is also known for incubating and discovering young artistic talent and has exhibited in Art Hamptons, an international art fair in New York. In just over a year and a half of existing, the gallery and Sonariwo’s work has been profiled by global publications such as Financial Times, Forbes Africa and Vogue.
Evans Akanno, 27
The Future Awards Africa Prize for Creative Professional 2016
What do you do with a decade of combined experience in digital design, marketing and startups? If you’re Evans Akanno, you take a breath and plunge right in with yet another design agency. Looking for a fresh challenge, Akanno started Lagos based design agency, Cregital to provide digital solutions for businesses looking to capitalize on growing digital markets, and providing creative services and web products for individuals and organizations. Cregital helps brands make smart impressions. Launched in April 2015, the company already has in its portfolio work for high profile clientele such as Africa Magic, Africa Courier Express, Zenith Bank and Globe Motors. In 2016, Cregital organised a training on web design under its educational arm, Cregital Academy. The company also won the ‘Best Web Development Company of the Year’ category at this year’s Nigerian Technology Awards.
Bukola Bolarinwa, 28
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize for Advocacy 2016 | Endowed by Guinness
Bolarinwa is at the head of the fight against generational transfers of the sickle cell gene through her position as the president of Sickle Cell Aid Foundation (SCAF). The foundation which was created to improve awareness on Sickle Cell Disorder (SCD) has grown to be a recognised advocacy organisation in Nigeria. SCAF offers free genotype testing, awareness and counselling the six area council of the FCT. She also initiated the SCAFlympics, which promotes good health practices among Sickle cell warriors and draws attention to the physical limitations sickle cell eventually imposes on sufferers. In 2016, Bukola was selected for the Queen Elizabeth’s Young Leaders Programme in recognition of her work encouraging thousands of new people to give blood.
Julius Adewopo, 31
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize in Agriculture
Adewopo is currently leading a new frontier for agricultural development and facilitating partnerships to broaden opportunities for farmers in sub-Saharan Africa, implementing the geospatial aspects of a $12 Million project funded by Gates Foundation which is focused on improving the maize yield among African smallholder farmers. He is also co-leading the Africa-wide Weather Data Initiative, which is currently being piloted in Nigeria. Adewopo was appointed by U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) as a reviewer for the competitive Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) grant. Also, in recognition of his unparalleled expertise, he was enlisted by the globally renowned Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) to evaluate the institute’s staff research portfolio.
Adeola Osunkojo, 30
Winner, The Future Awards and EbonyLife Prize for Screen Producer
Transitioning from a career as a child/teenage actress, playwright and dancer is hard on most adolescents but not for Adeola Osunkojo. Osunkojo shifted focus to television/film writing, producing and directing cut her teeth heading the content development team at MTN’s music reality show Project Fame, working with the show for six years before she left to pursue other interests. Since then she’s leaned in to television, earning directing credits on serialized shows including the popular The Life of a Nigerian Couple on Ebony Life TV which she also created, wrote and produced to rave reviews. The Life of a Nigerian Couple was included in the first African Short Film Festival, hosted by the Department of African and African American Studies at Harvard University in September 2016.
Chika Oduah, 30
Winner, The Future Awards Africa and EbonyLife Prize for Journalism
From her base in Nigeria, she has worked for France24 as an international correspondent reporter since January 2015 and has worked as a producer and reporter for Al Jazeera since August 2013. The Medill School of Journalism and Georgia State University alumnus is a 2015 Finalist of the Livingston Young Journalist Award and the 2015 African Story Challenge Winner and Grant Recipient. In 2016, her article ‘The App That Saved 1,000 Children’ won in the Dow Technology & Innovation Reporting Award at the 2016 CNN African Journalist Award. The story focused on 24-year-old Nigerian computer enthusiast named Hamzat Lawal’s app that saved children in Bagega from dying from lead contamination. Chika reports from the human angle, capturing the human impact of the issues that affect people’s daily lives and have collaborated with Al Jazeera stories around the world to reporting on global projects.
Bolanle Olukanni, 27
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize for On Air Personality (Visual)
Olukanni, a Communications and International Studies graduate from Loyola University Chicago shot into the limelight after she won ‘Search for Mo’s Co-host’ competition in 2013. Her prize landed her a co-hosting job on ‘Moments with Mo’ alongside Mo Abudu and Dolapo Oni. Now rebranded ‘Moments’, she still co-hosts the Nigerian show alongside Toke Makinwa and Michelle Dede on EbonyLife TV. Bolanle has interviewed influential personalities such as Oscar-nominated actor Chiwetel Ejiofor, Grammy-award winning singer Brandy, Lagos State Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola, and does red carpet interviews at Nigeria’s most glamorous events.
Ayo Thompson, 30
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize for On Air Personality (audio)
As the host of Nigerian Info FM ‘The Woman,’ a weekly show that focuses on the Nigerian woman and everything that makes them phenomenal, Ayo Thompson gets to promote and uplift women distinguishing themselves in their various fields. This is a task she’s taken very seriously, drawing from a wide pool of seemingly ordinary to widely celebrated women and engaging each equally for their personal contributions to their communities, their country and women in general. Prior to that role, she was a co-host of the popular Breakfast Show on 99.3, Nigeria Info FM ‘Morning Crossfire’ where she garnered a wide following. She is one of our generation’s leading voices on air.
Mark Okoye, 31
Winner, The Future Awards Africa Prize for Young Person of the Year
Mark Okoye is the key player in regenerating the Anambra state economy and a sterling example for a generation typically averse to public service. At thirty years old, he became the youngest member of the Governor Obiano-led cabinet in 2016 and one of the youngest government officials in the country. Okoye brings tenure as a senior member of the investment banking division at Afrinvest (West Africa) Limited where he was instrumental in executing numerous capital raising and financial advisory transactions to his new position, leaving an illustrious investment banking career, to join the Anambra State Economic Think-Tank. This led to his appointment as Special Adviser to Governor Obiano on economic planning, budget and investments in 2015. His role involves him running the day-to-day activities of the Ministry of Economic Planning and Budget. In addition, he has operational and strategic oversight over Anambra State Investment Promotion & Protection Agency. The Harvard Kennedy School and Euromoney, Dubai alumnus has experience in governance, policy formulation, public sector financing, public budget analysis and corporate finance. He is undoubtedly shaping the future and economic wellbeing of our great country.
To find out more about the winners, go to www.http://thefutureafrica.com/
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