Kaboneka urges youth leaders to embrace good governance

The Minister for Local Government, Francis Kaboneka has urged youth leaders to be agents of good governance as they play their role in national development. Kaboneka was speaking on Friday during the 20th assembly of National Youth Council (NYC) where performance contracts of the 2016/17 fiscal year were reviewed and commitments for next year signed. “The Genocide against the Tutsi happened due to bad governance and leadership but it is good governance that rebuilt the nation after the dark period. The youth should invest their efforts in sustaining such good governance to sustain the development,” he said. He explained that following the Genocide, government introduced unity and reconciliation initiatives that promoted building of an inclusive state for all Rwandans. He told the youth that good governance would see the nation achieve national development goals. The minister urged the youth to make the most of their skills and talents to lift themselves out of poverty. Clarisse Uwanyirigira, the coordinator of NYC said that the performance contracts for the 2016/17 are at about 76 per cent interms of implementation. She said that across the country they had helped create 1,834 youth savings associations against the target of 2,148 and had also helped about 29,950 youth to start small investment projects. She added that they had facilitated 21,307 school drop-outs return to school against the 29,674 target. Uwanyirigira said that the youth have so far built 15,714 toilets exceeding the target of 8,592. The National Youth Council targets for next fiscal year include; curbing unemployment among the youth where they plan to help 300 youth cooperatives to get registration from the Rwanda cooperative agency, form over 2000 youth saving associations and help close to 30,000 young people open up small investments. The plans also involve facilitating the return of 14,800 children to school. “We are also about to launch competition in conjunction with the Private Sector Federation and The Ministry of Youth and ICT for young entrepreneurs across the country to promote entrepreneurship among the youth so as to reduce unemployment rate among them,” she added. Other goals include sensitization on fighting drug abuse, uptake of health insurance, hygiene, curbing unwanted pregnancies and embracing sports among others. editorial@newtimes.co.rw

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Kaboneka urges youth leaders to embrace good governance