Hundreds of youths descended on a hotel in Nyamata on Saturday for the inaugural Young Leaders Conference under the theme ‘Sowing Seeds of Excellence in Young Leaders Generation’.

The forum – organised by the Rwanda Leaders Fellowship (RLF) – served as a prelude to yesterday’s National Prayer Breakfast, a prayer session that brings together senior leaders from diverse backgrounds, including government, parliament, judiciary, civil society, private sector, among others.

The annual Young Leaders Conference seeks to help nurture and empower young leaders who are committed to serving the people and seeking God’s guidance.

This initiative is yet another opportunity availed to the Rwandan youth to draw inspiration from their older compatriots, step up to the plate and take their rightful place in the task of nation building, both presently and in the future.

As rightly observed by the First Lady, Jeannette Kagame, at the conference, leadership is not about position but rather service to the people

The young people of Rwanda today are lucky to have grown up during a generation of trailblazers and set-pacers, they have seen with their very eyes and learned from the gallant men and women who sacrificed all for the service of their country and compatriots.

The Young Leaders Conference is only the latest addition to a pleasant array of homegrown platforms and opportunities that have been availed to the Rwandan youth to grow and unleash their potential so as to transform their lives and impact those around them and their country.

And, with the ever-growing opportunities and investments into youth programmes have come great expectations.

The nation has high hopes in its young generations and expect them to make the most of these opportunities to take this country to greater levels in the years and decades ahead.

To meet and possibly surpass these expectations, the young people will need to continuously seek to embrace and uphold the very national core values that have shaped Rwanda’s resurgence over the last two decades or so: unity of purpose, unselfishness, hard work, patriotism, volunteerism, dignity (agaciro), self-sufficiency (kwigira), among others.

Never in the history of Rwanda have the youth lived in such exciting times, there hasn’t been a better moment for them, all today’s youth need is to seize the opportunity with both hands and make themselves count.