Tanzanians yesterday joined the international community in marking International Youth Day in a largely low-key manner.
This year’s theme for the Day is “Youth Civic Engagement”, which underlines the need for the engagement and participation of youth in achieving sustainable human development.
However, according to the United Nations, the opportunities for youth to engage politically, economically and socially are often low or non-existent.
Last year, during the International Youth Day, Tanzanian innovator Meck Khalfan and Nigerian singer Seyi Shay were cover stars on the latest issue of Africa’s leading youth-focused magazine, Y! Africa – released specially to mark IYD.
Khalfan, named the Africa Business Leader of the Year 2013 by the Corporate Council of Africa was chief executive officer of Puku LLC and innovator behind the Puku S8, inspired after Hurricane Sandy kept him hostage in New York City. He talked to ‘Y! Africa’ about his invention, the inspiration and how he sees the future of business in his home country – Tanzania – and across Africa.
Seyi Shay is one of Nigeria's fastest rising singers who traced her journey from a group founded by Beyonce's father to being spotted by Sound Sultan, groomed by Cecil Hammond, and finally setting out on her own in a male-dominated environment.
"We continue our mission of inspiring an evolving generation of Africa by telling stories of hope, of inspiration and of purpose," said Chude Jideonwo, editor in chief of the magazine and managing partner of its group, Red Media Africa.
"This edition speaks directly to the aspirations of young Africans working to make it both in and out of the continent," added the editor.
Few things are as frustrating as discovering that your phone has run out of charge and you have no easy way to recharge it. This is what confronted Tanzanian Meck Khalfan when there was a power outage in New York City. So he set out to build a charger that would put all others in the market in the shade”
It’s an ill wind that does not blow someone some good, so the saying goes. And a very ill wind, Hurricane Sandy, blew Meck Khalfan, a 36-year-old Tanzanian-born New York-based software engineer a lot of good when it hit the New York area in 2012, leaving many parts of the city without power.
It was lucky for Khalfan, who knew all about power outages and unreliable electricity supply growing up in Tanzania, that he was able to charge his iPhone and iPad using a portable battery pack charger loaned to him by a New York neighbor.
On 17 December 1999, in its resolution 54/120, the United Nations General Assembly endorsed the recommendation made by the World Conference of Ministers Responsible for Youth (Lisbon, 8-12 August 1998) that 12 August be declared International Youth Day.
UN says there has been recent increasing attention and policy and programming focus on youth civic engagement by governments, UN entities, regional and multilateral organizations, CSOs, youth and researchers. As part of its celebrations for International Youth Day, the Inter-Agency Network on Youth Development, led by the co-chairs, UN -Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) and UNDP, ran an online campaign that led up to International Youth Day 12 August 2015.
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN
