Ikorodu Doyen Lions Club celebrates 40th anniversary, launches fund for Neonatal Ward project

It was exciting and full-filled atmosphere at Oluwatoyin Lions Activities Centre (OLAC), Ibeshe road, Ikorodu, where members of Ikorodu Doyen Lions Club and its well wishers marked the Club’s 40th anniversary and also launched an appeal fund for N65 million to build and equip the Neonatal Ward (Children’s Ward) at the Agbala Paediatric Health Centre, Ikorodu as well as carrying out other core club’s projects.

At the event, the President of the club, Lion Kazeem Olatunji Olaegbe, said it was necessary to celebrate the anniversary with such a project that would not be forgotten in a hurry.

“Today, we are celebrating our club and also acknowledging the many tireless efforts of members, who have helped to build the club this past 40 years, especially the four charter members on whose foundation the club is built.

“We consider it necessary to mark the anniversary with a project that depicts what Lions club knows how to do best, bordering on impacting lives as well as engaging in diverse humanitarian services.

As usual, we conducted a need assessment at the Paediatric Health Centre where Ikorodu General hospital started, and arrived at the conclusion to renovate, refurbish and equip the centre so that those complicated cases that they used to transfer to the General hospital on referral, would henceforth be handled there with the aid of a resident doctor that would be on ground.

“We would have done the ground breaking today, but we are still awaiting approval from the Lagos State Ministry of Health,” he said.

Charter President and past International Director, Hamed Olugbenga Babajide Lawal, said it was necessary to celebrate the club that joined the mainstream of Lions club in Nigeria in 1982.

He disclosed that the Lion Club was inaugurated in Nigeria about 60 years ago as a single club in Lagos Island and today can boast of 10,000 members in Nigeria, asserting that the future of the association in the next forty years is unequivocally bright.

Lawal assured of good succession plan for the youth that will take over in future.
The District Governor, Lion Fortune Wagbatsoma, congratulated the club for being outstanding in its achievements in service, membership and leadership these past 40 years as she urged the club not to rest on its oars.

“I use this occasion to celebrate our revered leader, PID, H.O.B. Lawal, the only international director to have emerged from Nigeria and the Grand Patriarch of the club, as he celebrates 40 years of dedicated service as a Lion,” she said.

The Chairman, 40th Anniversary Planning Committee, Lion Femi Aluko, also assured that the project would be completed in six months.

“For Lions club, we are humanitarian organisation and this is what we are known for all over the world. We help the poor and the needy. We identified this area of need and knowing that the government cannot do it alone, we decided to play our part,” Aluko said.

At the event were the Royal Father of the Day, (Emugoriade 1), Adeboruwa of Igbogbo Kingdom, His Royal Highness Oba Semiudeen Orimadegun Kasali, the Chairman of the occasion, Odofin of Ikorodu Kingdom, Chief Adewunmi Ogunsanya and Senator, Lagos-East Senatorial District, Tokunbo Abiru, among others.