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From World Press Freedom Day

The following post is by Aidan Eyakuze, a 2006 Tutu Fellow and the Executive Director of Twaweza, and it describes how the Tanzanian government silenced an event on press freedoms in East Africa on the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes Against Journalists ~ AFLI

Twaweza in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda joined the media community to call for an end to the intimidation, violence and murder of journalists on November 2, which is the day the world marked the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes Against Journalists. On November 1, 2019 at 10.00am, a regional press conference was planned to share these data and insights.

Award-winning journalist John-Allen Namu's production company has released a new documentary series, Bitter Harvest. The 2017 Tutu Fellow examines the growing negative impact of pesticides on food being grown in Kenya.

Released on World Food Day, the series notes that importation of agrochemicals increased by 144% over the course of the past four years into Kenya.  Many of these are pesticides and herbicides linked to cancer and being used by small-scale farmers. Additionally, protective gear is frequently not used and workers are dying from exposure to these products.

The series is broken into three chapters.

I took a few weeks ruminating what the struggle for gender equality should look like in Swaziland. When I finally settled on an idea I wasn’t sure how to bring a seemingly esoteric argument to what is usually a rational discussion.

My idea percolated clearly in my mind; women must reclaim their being-ness if we are to move any further in the struggle for gender equality. “Being-ness” is defined as “the act or state of being. Being is more than just existing. Being is who we are at the very core of life, the way we were created, established and called to live. Who we are before being influenced by family history, economics, personality conflicts, consequences of choices made, or pressures we have allowed others to place of us such as culture and religion.”

Governance of the African Leadership Institute's Project Pakati is provided by a Youth Advisory Board. The Board's terms of reference are such that the position of co-chair runs for a six-month period only. Thereafter, the board co-chairs, together with the secretariat vote in a new set of co-chairs. This rotational arrangement has been put in place to allow the young leaders of the youth advisory board to be exposed to the experience of chairing a board and to leverage the experience for their growth and development.

Pakati's Project Associate, Josias Ambeu, attended the Pan-African Youth Forum in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in April 2019. The forum provided more than 400 young people from across Africa to share ideas, debate issues, and influence how the African Union (AU) invests in Africa’s youth.

At the forum, ONE interviewed Josias about the work he has done and his insights and the interview in full has been posted on their website. Josias was also at the event to connect with Aya Chebbi, the AU Youth Envoy, about the work being done by Pakati and how it is shifting young leaders to the centre of the African development narrative.

One of Project Pakati's board members, Mwesigye Patrick, has been awarded the Global Youth Leadership Award on Universal Health Coverage by the World Health Organisation. Twenty-eight-year old Mwesigye is the founder and team leader of the Uganda Youth and Adolescent Health Forum.

It is a dynamic youth-led organization that seeks to advance quality health and well-being of adolescents and young people and promote gender equality at the community, national and global level.

Monique Atouguia joined the staff of the African Leadership Institute as the new Project Manager of Pakati on 7 October 2019. Monique holds a BA Honours in Justice and Transformation (with distinction) and a BA in Economic History, Political Science and English Literary Studies from the University of Cape Town.

She is also pursuing a Masters in Organisational and Institutional Studies from the University of the Witwatersrand, part-time.

2007 Tutu Fellow Mezuo Nwuneli's Sahel Capital team has won the Impact Investment Award given by the Impact Investors Foundation at the Blending Finance for Social Investment Conference in Nigeria. The foundation says that the award honors and recognises a leading social enterprise and an investor within the Nigerian impact investing space who have made significant impact by providing solutions through their innovations, products, services or investments.

The award recognises entities who are able to set high standards through their business activities and investment decisions which further underscores the possibility of “doing good while doing well.”

2017 Tutu Fellow Jude Abaga - known more famously in the music world as M.I Abaga, the Nigerian hip hop star - became the first African artist with five albums in Apple Music's Top 100 Album Charts.  In his Twitter feed, he thanked his fans for helping all his albums reach that pinnacle. Doubtless the smack talk amongst rappers is going to be fierce, but it is an accolade that speaks for itself.

Jude is a producer and has been the CEO of Chocolate City since June 2015.  He won Best Hip Hop and Best New Act at the 2009 MTV Africa Music Awards, and was nominated in the Best International Act category at the BET Awards in 2010.

2017 Tutu Fellow Yap Boum II has been on the front line of the ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo since it began more than a year ago, in one of the deadliest  ebola epidemics on record.   In July, the outbreak was designated a an international health emergency by the World Health Organisation.

Yap is the regional representative for Epicentre Africa, the research arm of Doctors Without Borders, and has been directly involved in a Phase III trial ebola vaccine that is being used to reduce the numbers of people infected by the disease. Al Jazeera interviewed him about how the struggle to contain the disease is going.

A project implemented on Bioko Island in Equatorial Guinea by 2017 Tutu Fellow Mitoha Ondo’o Ayekaba to prevent malaria has won the P3 Impact Award at the 2019 Concordia Summit. In 2016, malaria killed 445,000 people, most were young children in sub-Saharan Africa.  The award was announced by the Office of Global Partnerships at the US Department of State, along with the University of Virginia and Concordia.  The P3 Impact Award recognizes leading cross-sector collaborations that feature public, private, nonprofit, or non-governmental organizations addressing societal challenges.

Nigeria's Business Day has written a lengthy profile on the groundbreaking work that 2007 Tutu Fellow Mezuo Nwuneli has done in financing and agribusiness.  It tracks how his company, Sahel Capital, started in agribusiness by backing a startup after discovering that a local noodle company was importing 50 tons of chili pepper a month. 

Mezuo and his wife, who ran the company, believed that chili could be sourced in Nigeria and set out to facilitate import substitution. This was a change from their initial business plan, which was to produce jams, spreads, spices, and seasonings.

Two Tutu Fellows are on the list of the Africa Youth Awards 2019 100 Most Influential Young Africans.  The list, which was published on 02 October, recognises young Africans whose work has impacted lives across the continent.  The two Fellows on the 2019 list were Rachel Nyaradzo Adams, who was in the Tutu Fellows Class of 2011; and, Nozipho Mbanjwa who was in last year's Class.

The list - which is now in it's fourth year - is comprised of people from 32 countries and celebrates the work of young Africans passionate about changing the narrative of their continent.

One of the Project Pakati's Youth-led and Youth Serving Organisation Portal ChangeLeads has made the prestigious 100 Most Influential Young Africans List for 2019, which is compiled annually by African Youth Awards. The ChangeLead is Viveksing Urjoon. This recognition of his work is made for it's impact on lives across the continent. The list - which is now in it's fourth year - is comprised of people from 32 countries and celebrates the work of young Africans passionate about changing the narrative of their continent.

The portal comprises a group set up by AFLI in its online collaboration platform to provide guidance on helping to set up a directory for youth-led and youth serving organisations that are helping people across the continent. The directory can be seen on the website Youthforyouth.africa

A lot of work is done on the sidelines when the UN General Assembly meets, and in October, global business Dalberg, partnered with The Africa Center and the African Leadership Institute to launch the Africa@Work: Future Forum initiative in New York City.  The initiative brought together leaders and innovators from across Africa and the world to create a shared vision around today’s challenges and tomorrow’s opportunities – especially those related to African youth and employment. 

Dalberg partner and 2019 Fellow Robin Miller said that Africa@Work provided curated conversations between Africans and the Diaspora that deepened a shared understanding of African labor market complexities; highlighted and accelerated innovative ideas; and channeled investments towards solutions that positively impact the future of work  in Africa.