Rotary club governor-elect tasks members on humility, self-less service

The Rotary Club of Nigeria, District 9127, has advised Rotarians to mentor new members by making the club irresistible through humility and meaningful projects, especially by engaging in meetings and cultivating a culture of inclusivity.

Speaking Wednesday in Abuja, during the District Learning Seminar, the District Governor-Elect 2025-2026, Dame (Dr) Princess Joy Nky Okoro, said members must have three critical priorities, including expanding rotary’s reach, diversifying club types and growing membership.

She said: “The training we have today is to train the district officers, and we call it the entire training, district team training for the Rotary Year 2025-2026. So they are all gathered here to be trained because they will be given different portfolios at the end of the training. This is the real Rotary way of bringing up a new Rotary Year. You have to get the officers trained before you give them assignments. When I say officers, all those sitting here today, some have served even as assistant governors. All of them here have served as presidents, so they are district officers. So they are here because they are now going higher than the position they have held before and they are like mentors now to other Rotarians so you get them trained so that they will have the knowledge they will be equipped to make impactful commitments in the various assignments they’ll be given.

“This is basic, it’s annual, so what they are getting here is what they will impart to their various assignments. The number of them? We’ve registered 200 senior Rotarians here for this training, after which they will be assigned. If you don’t have that sense of humility, there’s no way you can participate with the clubs. Rotary is so versatile that you have different kinds of human beings and you have to have the courage and that is the essence of this training. You have to behave as a leader because you know you have the knowledge. You cannot just come to a club where you don’t know anything. It will look as if this guy is just here, or this lady is just here to bamboozle us and the rest of them. And at the end of the day, you go without anything.

“As a Rotarian, I have done a lot. I have a community here in Abuja. When I became president of Rotary Club of Asokoro, from Asokoro to Maitama, as the chapter president, with my fellow Rotarians, I adopted a village. Since 2012, we have been impacting so much to the village.

“When I say adoption, it’s just like adopting a child. You give everything. You give everything you have to the child. When we go to the community, we look for their need assessment. We do a lot of need assessment. What are their priority areas? From their priority areas, we identify their problems and move ahead to implement. We have given them a lot.

“The club has given them a lot. We’ve done so many boreholes. We have renovated the community health centre. We have been paying school fees for the pupils and students of the community. So a lot has been done. And being the chapter president of that club, I am highly involved. We do contributions. Apart from the Rotarians contributing, we meet some of our friends. We meet our families, we meet corporate bodies, and all kinds of people to assist us to execute projects.

“Emphasis on the next Rotary year is membership. So what I’m advising the participants today is to focus on membership. Like I said earlier, there must be humility, there must be courage, there must be empathy so that they can influence their members to get in at least one member every month or two members every month so they can increase the membership in the district.”

Speaking earlier, the District Governor of District 9127, Mike Ukachi Nwanoshiri, who is expected to hand over to the District Governor-elect on July 1, said the club sets measurable, achievable, reliable and sustainable goals for the benefit of the larger community.

“The training for our members is important because if we don’t train them, they will not be able to understand where the District Governor-elect is going. I did it during my year and that’s why I’m having a successful year. You have to train your members, especially the district officers that will serve with you. In fact, in Rotary, the assistant governors and district officers that are being trained today will be of great help to the governor whenever she is not there. So it is necessary that we train them, equip them with the knowledge of where we are going to, our goals, what we plan to achieve, the project we want to do before our year starts. That’s what the district governor elect is doing today. It is just like a governor in the state, you have commissioners, you have director of this and that and so on

“The first goal we set is to increase our impact and membership increment, youth empowerment. We make sure that each goal we are setting is measurable, achievable, reliable and sustainable, not just making a goal. There’s nothing free in the world. If you are eating free food, somebody paid for it. If you are entering a free car, somebody will fuel it and drive it. We, the Rotarians, have chosen on ourselves that before we joined Rotary, that we would be humanitarian providers. So, no matter how the economy is, we are still doing the same thing now,” he said.