Skills training and cooperative funding access for underserved and rural communities — because economic inclusion and leadership development are inseparable.
Empower the Unreached Core is MLI's economic inclusion and community leadership programme — delivered in partnership with SMEDAN (Nigeria's Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency). The programme provides skills training, financial literacy, and access to cooperative funding structures for rural dwellers and underserved communities who have been systematically excluded from mainstream economic development.
The programme operates from a core conviction: communities without economic agency cannot sustain principled leadership, and communities without principled leadership cannot sustain economic development. The two are not separate imperatives — they are the same one.
Participants gain practical vocational and business skills, access to cooperative funding mechanisms that allow small groups to pool resources and access capital they could not access individually, and the leadership and organisational capacity to sustain community-level economic initiatives long after the programme ends.
Rural dwellers and underserved community members, particularly in Osun State and surrounding areas, who lack access to mainstream skills development and enterprise funding programmes.
Delivered in partnership with SMEDAN. Programme combines classroom-based skills training, cooperative funding facilitation, and community leadership sessions. Participants are organised into cooperative groups that continue to function as economic units after the programme.
Whether you are a prospective participant, a school or institution interested in hosting the programme, or an organisation considering partnership — we would love to hear from you.
Or email us directly: info@matadorsleadershipinstitute.org · We respond within two business days.