Kolawole Adepoju
By Adebayo Obajemu
Having a milk of human kindness and unconditional commitment to the plight of the poor and deprived members of society is not something that runs deep in many a life.
And in a suffocating environment defined by economic meltdown such as ours, it has become extremely hard to squeeze commitment out of Nigerians to the plight of the needy, the poor and those deprived of basic human needs like education.
But such commitment comes easily from Engineer Kolawole Adepoju who has been doing his best within limited means to uplift the lives of the needy through his Kolawole Dream Foundation, which was officially launched Sunday, November 30, at La Scalla Hall, Muson Centre, Lagos.
The launch brought together Adepoju’s friends who share his philanthropic spirit and bought into his commitment to the plight of the needy.
The colorful event was compered by Kenneth Akan, a consummate entertainer who garnished the event with jokes and anecdotal details of culinary richness of Nigerian foods
Speaker after speaker commended the Foundation initiative, pledging to support it to succeed in its desire to make impact on the lives of the needy in such critical areas identified as focal point for investment: education, health and community interventions.
Adepoju noted that it’s not necessarily factual that one has to be rich to help others, emphasizing that little acts of kindness can go along way in making a difference. This view was also shared by all the invited guests who came to launch the Foundation with undisclosed financial commitments. Adepoju said “We live in a world where there’s a big divide between the have and the have not , and the gap is getting wider by the day.
According to him, it’s absolutely important for those blessed to reach out those in need in the society.
On the core focus of the Foundation, Adepoju stated that” We have three areas of commitment which we have mentioned: Education, health and community interventions. We will continue to adopt schools where we”ll make investments and also offer scholarships to indigents so that they pursue and realize their dreams and aspirations.
For him, opportunities are not universal but skills are; noting that ” there are many students that are brilliant but lack opportunity. Because of this realization, as we adopt schools, we’ll go a step further to identify indigent students in those schools that we can give scholarships to pursue their dreams of becoming whatever they want to become without hindrances.
The Foundation was constituted with a Board consisting of technocrats. They are Seyi Adefemi,Lekan Onipede, Olawale Adepoju,
Kenneth Akan and Kazeem Adeoye.
Adepoju averred that he has singlehandedly been funding the Foundation for years, adding that to make more impact in the society, he decided on the formal launch, saying like minds can partner and collaborate with the Foundation to help the needy in the society.
The event which also doubled as fund raising attracted many friends and others who shared Adepoju’s vision.
