‘An island of sanity’ -Iyin Aboyeji explains the reason behind building a city for Nigerian tech talents

Ejike Kanife
Iyin Aboyeji Resigns as Flutterwave CEO as Startup Gets New $10m Funding From Mastercard, Others
Iyinoluwa Aboyeji

It is no longer news that many young Nigerian professionals are in a hurry to leave the country. From doctors and engineers to pharmacists and accountants, the struggle to leave for saner climes gets more real every day.

Nigeria ranked 12th in the 2020 world migration chart with 0.295 migrations per 1,000 population with an expected 2.640% growth rate. According to Statista, 1.3 million people migrated from Nigeria in the same year.

Nigerian tech talents aren’t excluded from this exodus as the insecurity, low standard of living, skyrocketing cost of foodstuff and other commodities and general mishap of living in Nigeria affects them as much as everyone else.

This has forced many tech talents to seek employment beyond the shores of the country. Due to globalisation, getting foreign jobs while in Nigeria is no longer as tedious as it used to be. The downside, however, is that because of the same globalisation, many of these foreign companies want their Nigerian talents to be based exactly where they are, in Nigeria.

Nigerian developers

For senior developers who see foreign jobs as a means to escape the difficult and unassured life in Nigeria, this doesn’t fit into their plans. Apparently, according to Founder and General Partner at Future Africa, Iyin Aboyeji, these developers still request to leave nonetheless and this has created a new kind of problem.

“I spoke to the CEO of a company that hires a lot of Nigerian senior developers and their biggest problem is getting them to stay in Nigeria,” Iyin said in a tweet.

The Nigerian tech leader went on to explain that the idea behind the proposed Talent City which is currently in the works, is to create a vicinity far away from the madness that characterises Nigerian life. This city would have everything a tech talent would get abroad like home, power, data, a beautiful ambience with lots of trees, and the most important of all, sanity.

“This is why I’m really bullish on Lagos Talent City. We need to create an island of sanity for the builders of tomorrow,” the tech leader and co-founder of one of Nigeria’s biggest fintechs, Flutterwave said.

Talent City

Talent City Lagos is proposed to be a community of tech professionals and enthusiasts located in the Lekki free trade zone, Lagos. Residents at the city include founders, developers, venture capitalists, designers and other talents which makes it a true tech ecosystem.

'An island of sanity' -Iyin Aboyeji explains the reason behind building a city for Nigerian tech talents
Image: TalentCityNG

Set to be completed by 2023, Talent City will be designed to be an eco-friendly and green city and as such, vehicles with combustion engines are not allowed. It boasts of all the infrastructure and amenities one could need for remote work like fast internet, uninterrupted power, convenient transit, etc.

It is also a business-friendly environment with policies that guarantee zero corporate tax and ease of remote company registration. There will be lots of coworking spaces, parks and smart homes for the residents to live in.

Founding residents will include Iyin Aboyeji; Bundle CEO, Yele Bademosi; Eden Life CEO, Nadayar Enegesi; Ventures Platform’s Kola Aina; Buycoins CEO, Timi Ajiboye; Former Google Designer, Coco Liu; and the World Bank’s Maleeka Rahma Meteden amongst others.

https://technext.ng/2021/08/12/cchub-ceo-bosun-tijani-advises-young-nigerian-developers-against-multiple-jobs/

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