The First Chapter

Good day everyone, family and friends. I would like to take this opportunity to share with you our project for 2017; as it stands I cannot execute it successfully without your collective help because it is a national project in which we all have a role to play. I am a passionate die-hard unrepentant Nigerian patriot whose vision is to help build a United and Patriotic Nigerian nation as I believe this is the only way Nigeria can truly move forward.

Efik 

This vision led to the birthing of the Many Roots One People campaign, a campaign which aims to erase all divisive lines that have held us back as a people (ethnic lines, religious lines, political lines, etc.) and replace this with one LINE, the Patriotic line. As we say “Nigeria is no mistake, mistakes do not survive 100 years” and also “the diversity of our nation is the beauty of its perfection”. In line with this mandate we would be creating a National monument; a national symbol of unity which I have tagged “The National Portrait”.

The National Portrait is a portrait of all the 370 tribes in Nigeria; it is a photo collage of a male and female model in the traditional attires of each tribe.

The reason we are using same faces to represent each tribe is to drive home the #manyrootsonepeople message (it doesn’t matter what tribe you’re from, we are one and the same). 

Once completed we shall be unveiling the National Portrait to the world in Abuja in front of dignitaries from different walks of life, the tentative date for this is May 21^st 2017, which is the international day for diversity. 

After the unveiling we shall be presenting the National Portrait to the Presidency or Senate for ratification as a National Monument.

As you can see this is an enormous task, but it isn’t impossible especially when we work on it collectively.

Bini

We would need your help in the following ways:

1. Gathering of information on the various tribes: we need to verify the facts on each tribe especially with regards the traditional attires. We would be opening a thread where you can help us identify the tribes, upload pictures of the respective traditional attires and suggest where or how we can acquire the said attires.
2.  Funding: the project is rather capital intensive, we have a modest budget of N9.4million which covers costume, accessories, props, makeup, professional fees of photographers, models & make-up artiste, production of Portrait, logistics etc. In order to raise the needed funds we shall be employing crowd funding strategy, this way everybody can play a part. In the coming days I shall be unveiling how you can specifically contribute financially towards the project as well as promote it within your circle (we have included some perks for contributors).
3. Spreading the word: we would also like you to help us build a worldwide following for this project. Since we intend for it to be a symbol of national unity, we need to create awareness around the project which you can help us spread through your social media networks.



Nupe Women

4. You can also volunteer directly to be a part of this project, for this we require passionate patriotic volunteers who would help drive this project with their skills and time. Either by sharing ideas that would aid execution; or promoting it on social or contemporary media; or linking us with persons of interest; or any other means you believe you can step in.

Kanuri Children

Over the next couple of days and weeks I shall be putting up updates on the project, please kindly look out for this. I look forward to making history with you even as we build our Nation together in unity.

Thank you for your time.

OJO Olanrewaju