Dabiri-Erewa, Khalfani, Adaba, Anderson, Kolawole, Umesiri, Akande, Coker, others feature  

Top media practitioners, political and business leaders, diplomats, scholars, activists and other stakeholders will, on Friday, September 20, 2024, converge, for a virtual Dialogue on “The Media of the Future,” a side event of the Black Futures Summit taking place on the sidelines of the 2024 United Nations Summit of the Future in New York, United States of America (USA).

The UN Summit of the Future is taking place during the 2024 United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), which will feature High Level Debates by leaders from different countries of the world who will congregate in New York.

Friday’s Dialogue, with the theme “The Media of the Future: Bridging the Gap Between the West and People of African Descent,” is being put together by Global Patriot Newspapers (GPNews), and will feature as Panelists, such well grounded personalities as Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa, CEO, NiDCOM, Professor Akil Khalfani, Director, Africana Institute, Essex County College, New Jersey, USA,  Oyiza Adaba, CEO AfricaRelated, Yul Anderson, President, African America Future Society,  Simon Kolawole, CEO, The Cable Newspaper, Toyin Umesiri, CEO, Nazarau, Laolu Akande, Editor-in-Chief, Empowered Newswire and Nicky S. Coker Esq., Spokesperson, Permanent Mission of Sierra Leone to the UN.

The Dialogue, according to a statement by Simon Ibe, Publisher/Editor-in-Chief of Global Patriot Newspapers, will attempt a review of the current state of the media of People of African Descent in comparison with that of the West, make projections concerning what the ideal should be, and recommend what must be done for the existing gulf to be bridged, and for the media of People of African Descent to attain the desirable heights, in the interest of all.

The log in details for the program, which starts at 3:00PM (EST), 8:00PM (WAT) are:

Meeting ID – 874 3571 2414

Passcode – guest

The Panelists

Hon. Dabiri-Erewa was a celebrated broadcast journalist who went on to become a multiple-term member of the Nigerian House of Representatives, before being appointed the Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NiDCOM). She was also named Diaspora Champion for her efforts to mobilize other African countries to set up Diaspora Commissions in their countries to cater to needs of their nationals living outside their countries.

Akil Khalfani, the Director, Africana Institute of Essex County College, Newark, New Jersey, is an acclaimed pan Africanist and a Professor of Sociology. A committed community leader, he ran for election to the U.S. House to represent New Jersey’s 10th Congressional District in 2022, and is back in the current race. He is also media personality.

Oyiza Adaba, daughter of Professor Tom Adaba, the pioneer Director General of Nigeria’s National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) is the CEO of New York-based multi-media organization, AfricaRelated, and the award-winning Producer of a widely acclaimed documentary on the internationally celebrated Ghana-born Sculptor, Professor El Anatsui.

Yul Anderson, the brain behind the Black Futures Summit and Afro4UN, is a Future Analyst and the President of the African American Future Society (TAAFS) Inc, while Akande, the Host of a popular Television show, Inside Sources with Laolu Akande, who served as Spokesperson for Vice President of Nigeria (2015-2023,  and before then, the North American Bureau Chief for The Guardian in New York, is currently the Editor-in-Chief of Empowered Newswire, an integrated news agency that he founded in New York.

Simon Kolawole, Founder/CEO of frontline pan African online media platform, The Cable Newspaper, was a Chevening scholar (2006), won a grant from the Centre for the Future State, University of Sussex for a Masters dissertation (2006), was nominated among Africa’s Next Generation of Leaders by The Banker Magazine, published by Financial Times of London (2009), was a Fellow of the Mo Ibrahim Governance for Development in Africa Initiative (2010) and was named Young Global Leader (YGL) by the World Economic Forum (2012).

Toyin Umesiri, the creator and host of the TV Show, Quantum Leap which airs in Aurora, Illinois, USA; was appointed by the U.S Secretary of Commerce to serve on the Illinois District Export Council (ILDEC) in 2022, served previously as Ambassador for Intra-African Trade by appointment of the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) and the African Union (AU) and currently serves on the Board of Directors of Westrock Coffee Company, a leading integrated coffee, tea, and extract service provider in the US.

A global influencer, Umesiri is an Author, world-class Business Educator, Supply Chain Strategist, Founder and CEO of Nazaru, Convener of the acclaimed Trade with Africa Business Summit and provides Entrepreneurship and International Trade Support, Training and Education in her Business School, and Community and Advisory and Consulting Services to Government Agencies and Multilateral Institutions.

Madam Coker Esq.,  is a trailblazer in her own right. The Spokesperson for the Permanent Mission of Sierra Leone to the United Nations in New York for Sierra Leone’s two-year term on the Security Council (2024-2025), Madam Coker is an Activist Lawyer who was appointed to her present office from PURPOSEFUL (an African-rooted global hub for girls’ activism and resourcing young feminists.

A Barrister and Solicitor of the High Court of Sierra Leone, she was the Senior Litigation Adviser and Head of Advocacy and Movement Building at PURPOSEFUL. Previously a State Counsel at the Ministry of Justice and Senior Defense Counsel at the Sierra Leone Legal Aid Board, Coker Esq. also served as General Secretary of the General Legal Council (the authority responsible for the regulation of the legal profession in Sierra Leone) from 2017 until her move to New York in 2024.

Named one of the 100 Most Inspiring Sierra Leoneans and 50 Most Influential Sierra Leonean Women 2019 and 2020, Nicky, a former presenter of the weekly Saturday Breakfast Show on Capital Radio SL, in 2007, navigated seamlessly through moderating for the Vice-Presidential Candidates’ Debate during Sierra Leone’s General Elections and served as the Legal Analyst for the Eminent Women’s Situation Room during Sierra Leone’s 2018 and 2023 Elections.

Professor MO Ene, one of the two Moderators of the program, is popularly known as “Chairman Moe.” A doctorate degree holder in automotive engineering from the University of Southampton, England, Dr. MO, who has taught various university courses at four universities on three continents is multilingual, has authored and published many consequential books and seminal documents in academics, culture, fiction, and current affairs.

A widely travelled campus citizen, he is multilingual and an ardent across-the-curriculum scholar who set up, in the 1997, one of the first Afrocentric magazines on the Internet: www.kwenu.com. Before the advent of AI, he pioneered Cyberology: the study of cyberspace – history, evolution, sociocultural trends, and the changing human society.