The International Energy Insurance(IEI) has promised its continuous investment in children by selling the message of insurance through sponsorship of major events targeted at children and teenagers in the country.
To this end, the insurance firm sponsored the 2023 edition of the Kids & Talent Africa Finals event which took place in Lekki, Lagos, on Sunday, where three finalists were selected for the 2023 award.
The Dynamic Stars, which is a group of kid and teen dancers, won the star prize of N500,000 having been declared the 2023 winner of the competition, while Chrysolite Crew came second with N100,000 cash prize with Moyinoluwa Sodeinde coming third with N50,000 cash prize.
Kids & Talent Africa Finals is a firm that organises talent hunts annually for children and teenagers with the motive of identifying and developing talents of children from young age.
Speaking on the sideline of the event, the managing director/CEO of IEI Plc, Mr. Supo Sogelola said, the involvement of IEI Plc as one of the sponsors, was in line with the goals of the company to support children in realising their life ambitions, adding that, this is also meant to preach the gospel of insurance to the children at such a young age so that they can grow up to appreciate insurance services or even grow up to practice the profession, just like him.
Promising that his underwriting firm plans to sign 5-years sponsorship agreement with Kids & Talent Africa Finals, he said, the gesture gel with the aim of his insurer to invest in children, sports and edutainment.
According to him, “ as a company owned by Norrenberger, IEI Plc wants to ensure we sell the message of insurance to the children right from childhood so that they can grow up with the understanding of how insurance works and by that, we will be increasing insurance awareness and the kids can grow up to pick interest in insurance in the future.
“Apart from selling the brand, it’s a means of advertising insurance generally. IEI, now powered by Norrenberger, feels it is also a way of selling insurance, making insurance popular with the children from school. We are going to sign like a five-year sponsorship deal with Kids and Teen Got Talent. That is our plan and each year, we make it bigger, better, lovelier and interesting, such that we continue to entrench the brand and also, insurance in getting children and teenagers’ talents that were hidden and show them to the world. So, we are going to be doing this often. What we are doing is not wasting money, but building talents.”
Similarly, the founder, Kids & Talent Africa Finals, Mr. Kola Lenson, who was elated by the competitiveness of the competition, stated that, the 2023 edition was one of the most keenly contested, with 32 teams participating, before they were trimmed to 10 out of which the second and first runners up and the winners were chosen.
While thanking sponsors of the event such as IEI Plc, among others, he said, he, being a former teacher, felt that the fact a child isn’t good academically doesn’t mean he or she can’t be useful somewhere else.
Hence, he said, the motive of the programme was to identify talent and breed them, stating that, all the participants came from different schools across Lagos State.
Promising that his outfit tends to create a community for the participants to continue to nurture their talents to adulthood, he said, currently, there is no industry for children entertainers, which is a gap that can be filled in the future.
He called on relevant stakeholders to come enmass to support his laudable initiative, promising that, the future of Kids and Teens Talent Africa looks brighter.
“The idea is to help everyone, especially, children discover there talents earlier, so that, they can build on it to make the most out of their talents. Everybody has talents, but the school focus on academically sound ones. It’s now left for we teachers to find out those who are talented in other areas. What we are looking at, which we have not started, is to have a continuity programme for them where we will situate them in, maybe movie industry that are strictly for children which we don’t have now. We hope in the near future, we will start something in that regards,” he pointed out.
