Mobi Akiode (at right) was working as a junior accountant with ESPN last year when she decided to give up her job, pack up her apartment and move from Bristol, Conn. to Lagos, Nigeria. The 27-year-old who had played high school and college basketball in the States, and been a member of the Nigerian women’s team in the 2000 and 2004 Olympics, had made the move, according to this ESPN article, because she wanted “to inspire and empower impoverished young women, first in Nigeria and then throughout the African continent.”
That goal is slowly being realized, courtesy of her Hope 4 Girls Africa program, which included the first Hope 4 Girls basketball camp last August. More than 60 girls attended, some having traveled for days to get there, and some even had to plead with her to let them attend since the camp was over-enrolled. The success of the program lead her to quit her job at ESPN and return to Nigeria, holding a second camp earlier this year. And as she said in a chat on ESPN, it happened because of how people responded to the camp:
“It’s been life changing. I feed of (sic) their energy. I couldn’t have done what I did in quitting my job and moving over here if the response wasn’t as great as what it is. I have girls emailing me from other countries asking me how they can bring Hope4Girls to their country.”
While the camp focuses on basketball, education is just as important, and Akiode makes sure the girls believe in themselves and their future. As one of the campers, Aisha Adamu, was quoted, “I have this joy in my spirit. I can’t express it out. When I reach home, I’ll tell my mom, other girls, my brothers, my sisters, my neighbors all about Hope 4 Girls.”
You can find out more about the program at the Hope 4 Girls website. There was also a special, Her Story: Ten Times Over, that aired on ESPN on Sunday about Akiode and the camp. If you missed it, you can watch it at ESPN’s Outside the Lines.
Photo courtesy of ESPN.