Obama’s mentorship programme holds maiden forum at KU

The Young  African Leaders Initiative on Thursday held its inaugural homecoming meeting at Kenyatta University in Nairobi. 

The YALI was founded by former US President Brack Obama when he visited Kenya in 2015 as a signature effort to invest in the next generation of African leaders .

YALI Alumni Chapter of Kenya chairperson Fred Tunya said the programme has four Regional Leadership Centres in Ghana, Kenya, Senegal and South Africa.   

"YALI encompasses 14 countries in East, South and Central Africa," Tunya said. 

He said the key objective of the programme is to highlight the potential of young people across the region and give them a platform to train and cultivate their leadership potential. 

Thursday marked the homecoming of all the alumnus running from cohort 1 in 2015 to cohort 49 in 2023.

The Young leaders are selected from the 14 African member states of the programme and must be aged between 18-35. 

They must also have gone past high school and undergone training programme for one to two months. 

"People travel from their countries to KU for training. After training and certification, one joins the Alumni body allowing them to apply for the fund," he said. 

Other than training on entrepreneurship, public management and civic leadership, the young leaders have a chance to apply for a Transformation Fund for a project they are doing that will impact society positively. 

On Thursday, Tunya said they brought together the young leaders to understand their success stories and how they have been impacting their respective countries," he said. 

Tunya said the programme is fully supported by the USAID through the American tax payers' money. 

He explained that it took seven years to hold the first homecoming since at times they may want to bring people together but some of the projects being done by the YALI alumnus are yet to mature. 

"So we are bringing them now at a time when we feel extensively through sustainability plan, they have achieved some of these projects, implemented, executed, some have been closed and the impact has as well be documented," Tunya said.

The team has a monitoring and evaluation department which follows up on the implementation of the project, its impact and documentation. 

Tunya hopes that more young people will take advantage of the programme YALI offers to better their lives.