Rebecca Kaibanya, a 14-year-old pupil of Saint Augustine Secondary School Lungi has won the 2021 United Bank for Africa Foundation National Essay Competition winning a Le 50,000,000 scholarship grant. She is the first Sierra Leonean student to win the competition in its first edition in Sierra Leone. The topic for this year’s essay competition is ”Environment Resilience in Sierra Leone; Identify a Critical stakeholder and Present Their Interventions for Climate Change”.
After a series of scrutiny from the judges, twelve young students from different schools across Sierra Leone made it to the top 12. To appreciate and encourage the Top 12 Finalists, a laptop plus plaque/certificate of participation is also given to the Top 12 Finalists.
Below are the top 3 students for this first edition of the UBA Sierra Leone National Essay Competition:
- Rebecca Kaibanya of Saint Augustine Secondary School – first place winner and recipient of a Le 50,000,000 scholarship grant.
- Musa Ayowova Musa of The Sierra Leone Grammar School – second-place winner and recipient of a Le 30,000,000 scholarship grant.
- Sakinah Sarah Marah of Beacon High Secondary School – third-place winner and recipient of a Le 20,000,000
The National Essay Competition is a UBA Foundation Initiative for senior secondary school pupils across countries in Africa where UBA has branches. The National Essay Competition program has been running for the past 9 years in several countries, this is the first edition in Sierra Leone. The UBA National Essay Competition is aimed at promoting the reading culture and encouraging healthy and intellectual competition amongst secondary school students across Africa.
