Queen Tracy on a mission to impact young people, society

Winning the Most Elegant Girl in Nigeria (MEGN) Continental, last year, Tracy Aghogho Okitavwota never rested on her oars. She consciously worked to impact her immediate society, equipped less privileged young people with skills, mentored girls and empowering young people in the creative industry.

Knowing this was a very huge project, the queen partnered groups and people of like minds together to actualise her goal.

With Coronavirus (COVID-19) ravaging the world, including Nigeria, the beauty queen partnered other care giving organisations to produce of facemasks in their large numbers for distribution to different people, especially people at the grassroots to stay safe.

Also worried that some young people are starving as a result of the pandemic, she collaborated with friends to raise fund to buy food and distribute to indigent young people and the aged, aside enlightening them on COVID-19 safety measures.

Would you have done this without the crown? “No, I won’t,” she said, adding that the crown was a sort of challenge for her to be a better person, do greater things and as well to overcome fears and limitations in all areas of life.

Relinquishing the crown, last Sunday, having spent her tenure, Tracy disclosed that the crown turned her dreams into reality; as it enabled her touch lives and embark on community projects.

With the spate of rape cases across the country, Queen Tracy, as she is fondly called, set up a platform including on the social media handle to shed light on the need for women and men, including young people to ‘zip-up,’ respect each other’s sanctity and integrity and say ‘no’ to illicit sex.

Constrained by the COVID-19 pandemic to meet large group of young people, Queen Tracy disclosed that once schools are back to full session that her team would do a tour to different tertiary institutions and secondary schools to talk to young people about illicit sex and how girls can stay safe from rapists and concentrate on their studies.

According to the former beauty queen, her team looks forward to talking to the boys too, to make them understand that relationship and sex should not be by force, adding that if a girl says no to any clandestine relationship that such a girl’s decision should be respected and she should be left alone, as making her act against her wish amounts to abuse of her right and psyche.

Commending the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) resolved to deal with rapists in their states, Queen Tracy called on everyone to join the battle to eradicate this dastard act, especially as no one knows the next victim.

Harping on the need for young people, especially ladies to acquire entrepreneurial skills, the queen noted that doing this will not only enable them contribute to the society, fend for themselves, but would also make them added value to their persons.

The Queen revealed that most times young ladies become victims of one crime or the other because they do not know who to follow as role models. She advised young ladies to pick a model among the great Nigerian women like Arunma Oteh, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Chimamanda Ngozi-Adichie, among others, who are making waves within and outside the country.

“Young people should not use the excuse of the inequality in wealth distribution or their low birth status to be involved in criminal activities because there are different ways to get to the top without getting involved in any form of criminal act. Evidences abound to support this, as there are many young people out there positively ruling their worlds; so, there is no excuses for failure,” she said.