07/09/2026
TWO YEARS AGO, I HELPED BRING THE AFRICAN GENIUS AWARDS TO SIERRA LEONE.
BUT THE STORY ACTUALLY STARTED THREE YEARS EARLIER.
September 7, 2026 marks two years since Freetown hosted the African Genius Awards at Fourah Bay College (University of Sierra Leone) USL. Looking back at that moment, I realize that I never really told the full story of how I became involved with the African Genius Awards, how that relationship started, and how a partnership that began while I was a university student eventually led to me helping bring the awards to Sierra Leone.
The African Genius Awards, a special project of Priority Performance Projects, was launched in 2021. The inaugural edition was held on May 25, 2021, in partnership with the University of Pretoria and was hosted online via livestream. The University of Pretoria itself described it as the first African Genius Awards. The following year, the university described the 2022 edition as the second annual event, confirming that 2021 was indeed the beginning of the AGA journey.
And that was the same year I first connected with the African Genius Awards.
At the time, I was a university student at Njala University and I was in my third year. I was also building what would eventually become The African Dream. I didn’t have a fancy office. I didn’t have a computer. I didn’t have a desk. I didn’t even have a chair in my room. I was essentially running my platform from my bed with a smartphone, writing African stories, publishing them online and watching some of those stories reach hundreds of thousands of readers.
That phone was my newsroom, my office, my publishing desk and, in many ways, my entire communications department.
Then one day, I received an email from Dr Sifiso Falala, the founder of Priority Performance Projects and the person behind the African Genius Awards. The email came from South Africa, and my first reaction was caution. The internet is full of scams, and when someone you don’t know suddenly contacts you about an international organization, you have to do your due diligence. So I researched him, researched the organization, looked into the African Genius Awards and established that this was legitimate.
Once I was satisfied that it was real, I responded and say “Let’s do it. Let’s partner.”
That simple response became the beginning of a relationship that would eventually take me much further than I could have imagined at the time.
I wasn’t sitting in a corporate office when I made that decision. I was a young student in Sierra Leone, studying Agricultural Economics with no formal education in journalism and media, trying to build an African media platform with nothing more than a smartphone, an internet connection and a belief that African stories deserved to be told differently. Yet Dr Falala was willing to trust me and partner with me. That trust has remained one of the most important parts of the journey.
Over the years, I continued writing about Africa, African innovators, entrepreneurs, changemakers and people doing extraordinary things across the continent. I continued building The African Dream and using my phone to produce stories that reached audiences far beyond Sierra Leone. At the same time, my relationship with the African Genius Awards continued to grow.
Then came 2024.
Dr Falala contacted me again because he wanted the African Genius Awards to be hosted that year at a remarkable African university. One of the initial ideas being considered was Makerere University in Uganda. But when we discussed the possibility, I didn’t hesitate.
I said: Let’s host it in Sierra Leone.
I told him about my country, about our hospitality and about the way Sierra Leoneans welcome people. I believed that if the AGA came to Sierra Leone, people would embrace it, and I believed we could make it work. He trusted that judgment.
My first thought for a university was actually Njala University, my alma mater. But as I thought more deeply about what the AGA represented, I felt that Fourah Bay College was the right institution. Established in 1827, Fourah Bay College is widely recognized as the first Western-style university in West Africa and has an extraordinary history in African higher education. The symbolism was powerful: an awards platform created to celebrate African genius coming to one of the continent’s historic centres of learning to celebrate African excellence. (University of Pretoria)
So I told Dr Falala: Let’s do it at Fourah Bay College.
And then the real work began.
I started reaching out to the university. I made calls. I initiated conversations. I engaged with the leadership and administration of Fourah Bay College and the University of Sierra Leone. What followed was a series of meetings, discussions and engagements around the partnership, the proposed event and how we could make it happen.
I was part of that process from the early stages.
Eventually, the partnership between the African Genius Awards and Fourah Bay College came together, creating the foundation for the AGA to be hosted in Sierra Leone.
But securing the partnership was only one part of the job.
The next question was: How do we make people know about it?
That is where my PR and communications background came in.
With the support of Sallu Kamuskay, I embarked on a serious media campaign around the African Genius Awards. I appeared on AYV’s Wake Up Sierra Leone, one of the country’s major morning television programmes. I was interviewed by Rise Radio and later by Capital Radio, including an interview with Eric Kawa. We generated stories, created awareness, engaged journalists and used every available communication channel to make sure the AGA was not simply an event happening quietly in Freetown, but a major African story happening in Sierra Leone.
There were media engagements around the partnership itself, including the agreement between the AGA and Fourah Bay College, and journalists from major media houses were present. We created publicity around the event, the partnership and the broader mission of celebrating African excellence.
And the irony is that I was still doing much of this with the same philosophy that had defined my work since university.
A smartphone.
The same kind of smartphone that had allowed me to build The African Dream from my bed at Njala University was still one of my most important tools. I was writing stories, communicating with people, making calls, coordinating publicity, engaging journalists and pushing the narrative from my own little corner.
No fancy PR office. No huge communications team. No massive advertising budget.
Just a phone, relationships, communication skills, persistence and a willingness to do the work.
That experience taught me something that I still believe strongly today: public relations is not simply about having money to spend. It is about knowing how to communicate value, build relationships, create a compelling narrative and get people to care about an idea.
The African Genius Awards became bigger. Its visibility grew. The number of nominees increased across successive editions, and the platform continued to recognize exceptional Africans contributing to the continent’s development. The 2022 edition, for example, had 31 finalists selected from 69 candidates, and the University of Pretoria described it as the second annual AGA.
And then, on September 7, 2024, the African Genius Awards arrived in Freetown.
For me, seeing that event happen was deeply personal.
Because I remembered that email I received while I was a student.
I remembered sitting with my phone and wondering whether the opportunity was legitimate.
I remembered researching Dr Falala. I remembered saying yes. I remembered building The African Dream from my bed.
I remembered writing African stories that went viral from that same phone.
And I remembered the conversation in 2024 when I told Dr Falala: Bring the AGA to Sierra Leone.
Two years later, I can look back and see that this was more than an event.
It was a demonstration of public relations, strategic communications, media relations, partnership development, stakeholder engagement, storytelling and resourcefulness.
It showed me what can happen when Africans come together irrespective of their ethnicity, religion, political views, location, and clan status.
Most importantly, it reminded me that you don’t necessarily need a big office to do big things, if we put our minds to it and hold on to each others’ hands, this continent will and can achieve the impossible.
Sometimes, you just need to start with what you have.
For me, that was a smartphone.
That phone helped me build The African Dream. That phone still helps me tell African stories.
That phone connected me to Dr Falala, who later became an integral part of my life and that of The African Dream’s journey.
That relationship eventually helped bring the African Genius Awards to Sierra Leone.
And today, I am proud to say that I was not simply present when the AGA came to Freetown. I was part of the journey that helped make it happen.
I am grateful to Dr Sifiso Falala for trusting me when I was still a young university student with nothing more than a growing platform and a phone. I am grateful to the leadership of Fourah Bay College and the University of Sierra Leone for embracing the partnership. I am grateful to the journalists, media professionals and everyone who helped amplify the story. And I am grateful that I had the courage, years ago, to respond to one unexpected email with two simple words:
Let’s do it.
Two years after Freetown hosted the African Genius Awards, I am still proud of what we built.
Since then, the African Genius Awards have gone on to celebrate some of Africa’s most remarkable minds and changemakers, including, Dangote, Chinua Achebe and Bantu Stephen Biko, followed by Ali Mazrui, Wole Soyinka and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, and later Dr Denis Mukwege and Professor Tshilidzi Marwala.
That journey is something I will always be proud to have been part of.
And the journey continues.
Sometimes, you don’t need to start with much.
You just need to start.
