Tunde Ogunyale

Pronouns: He/Him

Organisation: Peacepace Initiative for Peace Advocacy and Developments

Country of origin: Nigeria

Profile

Abdulrasaq Olatunde Ogunyale is the founder and executive director of the Peacepace Initiative for Peace Advocacy and Developments, a youth-led nongovernmental organisation that promotes positive peace across the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria. Since founding the organisation in 2017, he coordinated numerous peacebuilding projects and campaigns focused on peace education as well as creating and sustaining a healthy dialogue. While peace is the central theme, his organisation’s work also promotes good governance, human rights, and quality education. Born in the Oyo state in the southwest, Tunde moved around extensively for his education, national service, and peacebuilding efforts. He is a practising lawyer and a chartered mediator who centres his practice around a firm belief in alternative dispute resolution. His path as a young African leader continues to inspire recognition. Renowned international bodies like the Rotary Foundation, the United States Institute of Peace, and the U.S. Department of State have commended him for his efforts. He is a Generation Change Fellow, Mandela Washington Fellow and Rotary Peace Fellow. Tunde earned a Master’s degree in Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Queensland in Australia with distinction.

Story

Nigeria is home to around 400 ethnic tribes and languages and often faces violent internal conflict, bias, and segregation. Tunde Ogunyale realised while growing  up in this environment, that peace is everyone’s responsibility and requires constant action. He recognised that miscommunication poses a barrier to the peace process, and thus established the Peacepace Initiative in 2017 to foster peaceful communication and coexistence. In his words, ‘peace is both a noun and a verb,’ meaning that peace is not merely a static condition but an ongoing action that requires the engagement of all stakeholders, including the youth.

Peacepace promotes peace through campaigns, dialogue and peace workshops, storytelling, and the annual National Peace Conference. Its goal is to reach and educate traditional leaders as well as the youth, specifically teenagers across high schools. In this endeavour, the organisation’s young Indigenous ambassadors play a crucial role in overcoming language barriers and building bridges. They often invite professionals from within and outside Nigeria for their training sessions and conferences, during which all participants are encouraged to share their ideas. Since its founding, the organisation has reached around 15,000 young students in high schools and engaged around 4,000 youths all over Nigeria through various programmes.

Tunde’s work as a lawyer and mediator also provides several benefits that promote peacebuilding. For instance, he understands that in tenancy disputes – which are conflicts conventionally settled by law – litigation divides people and is not always preferable. He instead begins his projects by identifying a problem and bringing people together to find sustainable solutions. In the past, Peacepace gathered around 50 landlords and explained to them the importance of alternative dispute resolution for strengthening relationships. 

While much of Peacepace’s work is violence-preventive, the organisation also works with communities in post-conflict settings to strengthen social cohesion. Tunde said that the key is providing a platform for dialogue while ensuring all stakeholders are present and heard. He understands community-based mediation as creating a safe and orderly space for relevant stakeholders to listen to one another and reach a common ground. Likewise, he advocates for dialogue as a strong communication strategy that fosters better understanding, rather than determining right or wrong through debate. ‘We are trying to promote unity; we are trying to let people know that we are all brothers and sisters irrespective of our background. Community-based or intergroup dialogue can help us understand ourselves better,’ said Tunde.

As a practising lawyer and executive director of Peacepace, Tunde said he has a lot on his plate. The non-profit organisation partly depends on his own funding and faces many difficulties, such as achieving credibility and getting official approval for projects in different communities. Yet, the positive transformations he witnessed prompted him to realise – ‘I reflect the light myself and discover that I'm more peaceful.’ He added, ‘People around me know that I am passionate about peace. Some of them call me Mister Peace’.