The Zango Women Livelihood and Empowerment Programme (ZANGWOLEAP), an initiative that seeks to empower youth in Zango communities, has held its maiden graduation ceremony for the first batch of 50 beneficiaries.
The 50 young female graduates selected from various Zango communities in Accra were taken through make-up artistry training for a month long by top Professionals in the sector. The graduation ceremony, which took place at the Ghana Police Mosque in Cantonment, was held under the theme: ‘Empowering the Zango Women into building financial freedom through skills development and capacity building.’
To ensure competitiveness and efficiency of the skills training, the participants were divided into groups of eight each and were handled by six professional make-up artists respectively. The 50 young women, upon completion of the three weeks intensive training programme, have been empowered and out-doored to begin their journey towards gaining financial freedom.
Media Personality and special guest for the event, Stacy Amoateng, in her remarks emphasized on the need to be strongly empowered both in the mind and heart, have passion for what one does and belief in oneself.
She further stressed on the need not to allow gender, religion or environment to determine who what one becomes, urging the graduates to strive to be unique in the job market and not just copy what everyone else is doing.
“To you our graduating ladies, I advise you to learn how to take risk and be responsible, never to take relationships for granted, have the zeal to learn new things and most importantly listen,” she added.
Participants were also counseled to learn the habit of saving and investing as well as offering a helping hand to others.
The graduation ceremony was also graced by dignitaries including Hajia Zalia Qasim, Creative Director of ZAQI; Charity Anann Adupong, CEO Meannan Foods; Erasung Hadijah Ahmed Is-hak, founder of Myda Foods/MWELs; and Habiba Sinare, Actress/CEO of Eranissbyhabiba. They all took turns to offer words of encouragement and motivation to the beneficiaries.
The Founder of ZANGWOLEAP, Hajia Kuburah Diamonds, said: “see, these girls have taught me that, if you have the platform, opportunity and means to support people achieve greatness, just do it. Everybody can achieve their desired life goal if they get the support. ZANGWOLEAP will continue to support zango women to work on their potential which will serve us a source of income for them.”
