By Zainab Sesay
The 3rd African Youth Conference and general assembly ended at the Kairaba Beach Hotel yesterday.
The closing session was marked by elections into the new executive, the African Youth Commission, AYC.
Natalie Sonia Mukundane from Uganda was again elected as the executive chair person for the second time, Flomo Mau Maiwo from Liberia as the deputy chair person, Dennis Sangale Keis from Kenya for peace and security, Jennifer Yere Agbadi from Nigeria for gender, agricultural and rural development, Moussa Fara Diop from Senegal for political affairs and Patrick Michaelson Gibril from Sierra Leone for trade and industry.
Addressing the assembly after her reelection Natalie her priority will be to strengthen the organisation and also seek funds to maintain staff in the secretariat as they are young men and women working without pay.
She added that the AYC will focus on four key pillars namely, peace security, health good governance and human rights.
She described the Banjul meeting as the biggest and most successful African youth conference ever.
“Gambia has a history of hosting many successful conferences and one of the successes was that they were able to fly over one hundred delegates from across the continent and most of these delegates manage to pay for their tickets”, she stated.
The executive secretary of AYC, Kawsu Sillah said that the first thing the executive council will aspire to achieve all set targets and get the AYC fully
Meanwhile, the high-level advocacy engagement was led by UNFPA The Gambia, and organised by the African Youth Commission in partnership with the National Youth Council.
