The Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi through the Queen Moremi Ajasoro Initiative has partnered with the Simba Group to train 160 women who would be supported with tricycles in Osun State.

The beneficiaries were drawn from the four local government areas of Ife North, South, East and Central.

Speaking at the launch of the Queen Riders Initiative in Ile-Ife on Monday, the representative of the Simba Group, Mahendra Pratap, said after the training the women would be given tricycles to work with for public transportation.

According to him, the initiative would enable the women to earn their and support their families.

Pratap further said: “We started this Queen Rider programme in 2017. We train and give the women certificates and arrange driver’s licenses for them. We also assist them with finance from NGOs, microfinance banks and other philanthropic institutions.

“With that, they can earn their living and they are empowered. Initially, we planned for 160 in four batches of 40 each but with this huge response, we have to look at it again. Over 500 have already registered for the programme.

“We are trying to empower more women and whatever number that registers, we will attend to them. We have been going to different states, but Ooni has a lot of organizations supporting the society. We just want to join hands with them in supporting Nigerians.”

Oba Ogunwusi in his remarks called for support of other organisations and corporate bodies for more women to be empowered through the initiative.

He said, “We are imploring other organizations to partner with us so that we can engage more women. The transportation sector is a male-dominated sector. This time around, we have seen that these women can maintain these tricycles and people will pay them whenever they render services to them.

“Through it, they will be able to take care of their families. So, they won’t be dependent on their husbands and fathers again. We are imploring other organisations to cooperate with us to empower more women.”

Source: Punch