UBA EQUIPS 2020 TEF PROSPECTIVE ENTREPRENEURS

OVER 100 entrepreneurs who participated in an intensive business training organised by the UBA Tanzania as part of the preparations for the entrepreneurship development programme by the Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF).

UBA Tanzania decided to organise a free coaching session for the interested members of the public as part of its initiative to ensure that more Tanzanian entrepreneurs emerge as successful applicants for the programme this year opened in 1st of January 2020 and close in early March.

Since commencement of the TEEP in 2015, 189 Tanzanian entrepreneurs have benefited from the programme with a total funding support of 1.89 million US dollars (about 4.3bn/-) in the form of training, mentoring and seed capital of 5,000 US dollars each to support the implementation of their startup business ideas or grow their existing businesses.

Giving an inspirational speech at the training session held in Dar es Salaam on Tuesday, Joseph Kusaga, the Clouds Media Group’s Chief Executive Office (CEO), urged participants to capitalise on UBA Tanzania positive gesture by diligently completing their applications to enable them emerge as winners of the seed fund.

“You must focus, focus and focus but also, you need financial discipline,” he said.

He commended the UBA Group Chairman Mr Tony Elumelu for dedicating a huge amount of 100 million US dollars for the development of young entrepreneurs.

Encouraging young Tanzanian entrepreneurs to go for the application so as to reduce unemployment challenges, Mr Kusaga advised the youths to be upfront grabbing such golden opportunities which are very rare to find in our country.

Successful applicants will join the over 9,000 current beneficiaries, from 54 African countries and receive business training, mentoring, a non-refundable 5,000 US dollars of seed capital with access to global business networking opportunities through the TEF Connect; A fully integrated online realtime application that connects several entrepreneurs, their products and services across the continent.

Last year, the Foundation received about 216,000 applications, with 42 per cent coming from women entrepreneurs, from every country on the continent.

The TEF Entrepreneurship Programme is open to entrepreneurs from across Africa, either with new startup business ideas or existing businesses of less than three years’ existence, operating in any sector.

The TEF is the privatesector-led philanthropy focused on empowering African entrepreneurs.

The Programme targets small business owners, the foundation was established by Tony Elumelu (CON), who is also the Group Chairman of United Bank for Africa (UBA) operating in twenty African countries and three global financial service centres, London, New York and Paris.

The Programme is a 10- year, 100 million US dollars commitment to identify, train, mentor and fund 10,000 young African entrepreneurs.

The goal is to create millions of jobs and the revenue required for the sustainable development of the continent, in line with the Foundation’s philosophy of Africapitalism, which positions the private sector as the growth engine for Africa and emphasizes the importance of creating social and economic wealth.

One of the TEF alumni for the year 2017 Mr Allen Kimambo shared his experience with TEF and said that the programme is transparent and everyone, who apply and win, gets the 5,000 US dollars seed capital and enjoys free online training sessions via the TEF Connect.

“I encourage my fellow Tanzanians to grab this opportunity, all you have to do is apply online, submit your best business initiative and win free seed capital to implement your start-up business idea or grow your existing business,” he said.

The UBA Tanzania’s Managing Director, Usman Isiaka said the Tony Elumelu Foundation is the leading philanthropic institution in Africa with focus on entrepreneurship development.