Today, November 8, 2024, the Kigali Convention Centre hosted the opening ceremony of the YouthConnekt Africa Summit ’24, centered around the theme “Jobs for Youth Through Innovative Skilling.”
The event was attended by numerous dignitaries, including Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame, Prime Minister Samuel Ntsokoane Matekane of the Kingdom of Lesotho, UNDP Assistant Administrator and Regional Director for Africa Ahunna Eziakonwa, over 20 African Ministers of Youth, and Mumbi Ndung’u, Founder and Chief Changemaker of the Power Learn Project.
Thousands of young entrepreneurs, leaders, innovators, artists, and students from across Africa joined this 7th edition of the Summit.
In a dialogue focused on intergenerational perspectives for Africa’s future, President Kagame shared insights on the enduring impacts of governance on young people.
Reflecting on his personal experience, he remarked, “We grew up experiencing things that taught us many lessons, things that you don’t learn in school but you learn in life. I asked my father when I was twelve, who I lost when I was fifteen, “What did we do? Why are we here?” We were in a refugee camp, being fed with weekly rations. My father told a long story, but it was clear that it was politics, the leaders. It was a convergence of colonial times and the times of independence. Everything was just what it should not have been. Those are the lessons we learned. But it is disheartening that what I am talking about then, so many years ago in the sixties, some of that is still happening even now. You have people, especially young people, who are still suffering because of politics and all kinds of bad governance. What I experienced when I was four years old, why should it be happening now anywhere? Why should it happen anywhere on our continent?”
YouthConnekt Africa Summit: What You Need to Know
YouthConnekt Africa is a Pan-African initiative aimed at accelerating Agenda 2063 by connecting African youth for socio-economic transformation.
Adopted by 33 African Member States, YouthConnekt Africa provides a platform to address critical development challenges through ecosystem-building, knowledge-sharing, and collaboration.
Over the years, YouthConnekt Africa has become one of the continent’s largest platforms for youth-focused policy discussions and business initiatives.
This summit brings together essential conversations on the socio-economic development of Africa’s youth, covering diverse sectors and aligning with the African Union’s goals.
The theme for the 2024 YouthConnekt Summit, “Jobs for Youth Through Innovative Skilling,” focuses on the importance of preparing young Africans for future success. The summit highlights the need to develop essential, future-ready skills and explores scalable skilling solutions across Africa.
As the global population ages, Africa remains uniquely young, projected to be home to 42% of the world’s youth by 2030. By 2050, Africa will not only have the world’s youngest workforce but will also become a central marketplace for consumer goods and technology.
The 2024 YouthConnekt Summit, hosted by the Government of Rwanda, showcases the leadership and ingenuity of young Africans creating context-specific solutions for the continent’s needs.
The event will also challenge the ecosystem to invest more in skilling young people and building marketplaces for youth-led start-ups.