Odunayo Sanya: Our Focus is on SDGs, National Priorities

Odunayo Sanya is the Executive Secretary, MTN Foundation. Under her leadership, the foundation is not resting on its oars in advancing its mission, working together with communities and institutions across Nigeria. In this interview, she sheds light on some of the foundation’s interventions and its recent collaboration with the Nigerian Institute of Medical Research to advance the Nigerian health sector and the impact in curtailing the spread of infectious diseases. Chiamaka Ozulumba brings excerpts:

What is the MTN Foundation about?

The MTN Foundation is aligned with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the country’s national priorities in a bid to sustain national development. MTNF since its inception in 2005, has invested over ₦20 billion in empowering over 19 million Nigerians spread across 2,476 communities across the 36 states and the FCT.

You have recently been announced as the Executive Secretary of MTN foundation. What are the key focus areas for the MTN Foundation?

Over the years, the foundation has continued to evolve in terms of key focus areas. However, certain principles stand, and that is our alignment to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations and our commitment to the federal government’s priorities. We currently have two focus areas.

One is Youth Development. I am sure we all understand the reason why we must focus on youth development. Africa is a young continent by population, the same with Nigeria and we believe we can harness the power of the young people in Nigeria to create a future they can thrive in.

The second area of focus is National Priorities. Under this, we have projects like health and community development, and we express this through institutional partnerships such as the one with the Nigerian Institute of Medical Research (NIMR).

Why health?

The success of our business is tied to the well-being of the communities that we operate in. It is imperative that the community thrives for our business to thrive, and for us at MTN, health is important. When someone is healthy, half of their challenges are solved, and they are predisposed to do great things and to birth new ideas.

So, for us, health is key, and we believe that it is also an area of national priority for every government at different levels. A lot of people ask why we focus on this area because it is not related to what we do at MTN in terms of technology. But the truth is that the well-being of the people is top of the agenda for us and will continue to be.

With the rest of the world MTN was impacted by COVID-19. What was the implication of the pandemic for MTN?

Taking my mind back to 2020 when we heard the news that the Coronavirus was now in Nigeria, it was important to ensure the safety of our employees, customers and partners. We shut down the physical office operations.

We did this because it would not just be the employees that would be affected, they will interact with people who will in turn go back to their homes and interact with others. It was something totally new to everybody, and we ensured people experienced the level of comfort needed.

Recognising that it was important for people to stay in touch with family & friends, MTN committed to giving Nigerians 300 free SMS monthly, the provision of 100mb daily to customers to encourage them source for credible information about the virus from verified sources, free MoMo cash-to-cash transfer amongst many others.

We partnered with members of the private sector (CACOVID) to ensure that isolation centers were built, MTN did a lot at different levels. The story of the Oligo-Synthesizer started from there, we got the request from NIMR, we were committed to ensuring that we gave all that we can to the country where we operate in.

As we speak, many of our staff still work from home in MTN. We continue to encourage ourselves to take the vaccination and we are still pushing the campaign to stay safe and wear your mask.

How does it feel for you today to see the realisation of your hard work?

I love my team. For me it has been a year of understanding that there are times things do not go the way you want them to go, so you have to be flexible, open-minded and emotionally intelligent. I must say the team lived up to what they stand for.

A lot of the meetings with NIMR were coordinated virtually, we toured the manufacturer’s factory virtually. There were a lot of meetings, calls, emails, and a lot of disagreements too. We are all happy to see that we have eventually achieved our objective.

I am proud of the team because without them we will not be commissioning this first of its kind critical equipment in West Africa that allows for the local development of primers for the indigenous production of test kits for COVID-19 and other outbreak diseases. Utilised to its full potential, the lab will contribute significantly to the quality of medical research and development in Nigeria and West Africa.

The oligosynthesizer and its accessories have the capacity to produce 48 primers in one run. The establishment of the lab will drastically reduce the cost of responding to pandemics, including COVID-19, by making test kits cheaper to produce, save lives through timely and affordable testing and build local capacity in this area.

It is envisaged that this partnership will go a long way in moving NIMR closer to its main objective, which is to conduct research into diseases of public health importance in Nigeria as well as develop structures for the dissemination of research findings while providing the enabling environment and facilities for health care research and training.

The intervention is a partnership between MTNN, the Federal Ministry of Health and NIMR, and it speaks to the power of SDG17 ‘Partnership for the Goals’ in play.

The NIMR team must have shown some resilience, words, and encouragement to the MTN team.

Across both teams, we drew from each other’s strengths. There were times that we felt the process was taking too long, we wondered if we were going to complete this project, but they encouraged us, and we encouraged them. They came to the table with all that they had and looking at the NIMR partnership it was more about the possibilities.

It seems confident that the team has a sustainability plan

The team has the ability to check, monitor, and evaluate the outcomes periodically (quarterly, half-year and annual basis). We have a one year support plan in place with NIMR which covers provision of reagents and maintenance.

We expect it to positively impact the economy. We also look forward to celebrating the synthesis of the first set of primers from the NIMR-MTN Oligosynthesis Laboratory.

What are your thoughts on the importance of partnership with the government and the value that MTN continues to show the Nigerian government in the way they engaged and carried on with the Nigerian government?

The NIMR and MTN partnership is a testament to the fact that great things can be achieved especially when you have a private-public or public-private partnership.

I think it is important for the private sector to partner with the government, the reason is that the combined skills and competencies of both the Government and the Private Sector will provide scale and impact.

So if we are truly committed to the dream and project called Nigeria then we must as the private sector regularly partner with the public sector, and this happens across the globe especially in developed countries.

For MTN, we believe strongly in collaboration because we are good together when we walk together. We have a huge ecosystem of stakeholders in MTN Nigeria, including government institutions. We will like this partnership with NIMR to be an example to the private sector on how partnership with the government moves our country forward.

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So, for us, health is key, and we believe that it is also an area of national priority for every government at different levels. A lot of people ask why we focus on this area because it is not related to what we do at MTN in terms of technology. But the truth is that the well-being of the people is top of the agenda for us and will continue to be