EYAF Plans Education Fund, Intellectual Hub to Empower Anam Youths by 2036
By Uzo Ugwunze
The Elite Youths of Anam Foundation (EYAF) has announced plans to expand educational support, establish an Intellectual Hub and strengthen digital mentorship as part of a 10-year strategy to empower young people and promote sustainable development in Anam.
The foundation’s President, Dr. Christopher Ejike Anekwe, unveiled the priorities ahead of the organisation’s 10th anniversary on December 5, 2026.
According to him, EYAF intends to build a stronger institutional framework for human-capital development, moving beyond individual programmes to create sustainable systems that support young people and communities over the long term.
“Our ambition is to move from being primarily a programme-based organisation into a stronger institution for human-capital and community development,” he said.
A major component of the plan is a proposed Intellectual Hub that would connect graduates and undergraduates from Anam, providing a platform for mentorship, intellectual engagement and collaboration on community-development initiatives.
The foundation is also planning an Edu-Support Fund to coordinate educational assistance and widen access to learning opportunities.
The proposed fund would support scholarships, examination registration, back-to-school assistance, professional-course grants, skills-acquisition grants and emergency tuition support. It would also provide a framework for supporting library development and science and technical laboratories in identified schools.
Anekwe said EYAF would integrate technology more extensively into its activities through digital learning, online mentorship, virtual training and platforms for sharing educational, professional and entrepreneurial opportunities.
The foundation also plans to develop a continuously updated beneficiary database and strengthen its ICT and data-management systems to improve programme monitoring and information retrieval.
Beyond formal education, EYAF intends to sustain its focus on entrepreneurship, skills acquisition, youth employment and leadership development. Healthcare remains a possible area for future consideration, rather than an existing programme.
Anekwe said the immediate priority was to consolidate the foundation’s interventions across Anam’s eight communities before considering expansion elsewhere.
“Expansion should never be pursued simply for publicity,” he said, adding that any future expansion would require demonstrated need, adequate resources, organisational capacity and effective partnerships.
By 2036, the foundation hopes to have expanded its scholarship programmes, strengthened educational infrastructure, established a sustainable Edu-Support Fund and developed a network of professional mentors.
It also aims to document businesses and community initiatives established by beneficiaries, helping to demonstrate the wider effects of its empowerment programmes.
Anekwe further emphasised the need for effective governance and leadership succession to ensure that the organisation remains sustainable beyond its current leadership.
He said the foundation’s broader objective was to encourage Anam people, particularly young people, to move from waiting for opportunities to creating them and to embrace community development as a collective responsibility.
“The next decade will be a decade of institutionalising impact—building systems, opportunities, partnerships and leaders capable of transforming Anam on a larger and more sustainable scale,” he said.
Established in 2016, EYAF has a vision to raise and nurture new breeds of excellent leaders. Its motto is “Transforming Lives; Developing Our Communities.”
