Kenya's President appointed global champion for youth empowerment

Kenya’s head of state has a landed another international job months into assuming office for his second term.

President Uhuru Kenyatta on Friday accepted a UN agency’s request to become the global champion for youth empowerment.

United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Executive Director Henrietta Fore while making the request when she paid a courtesy call on President Kenyatta on Friday at State House said the Uhuru’s new role will include advocating promotion of universal healthcare, education and nutrition.

She assured the country of support in achieving universal healthcare.

“We can work in partnership to nurture talents so that children and teenagers between the age of 10 and 18 can be given life skills,” Ms Fore said.

Universal health coverage forms one of the key pillars of President Kenyatta’s big four development agenda that includes job creation, manufacturing, affordable housing, food and nutritional security.

“Education is key for youth development. It is a major catalyst for equity and social stability,” President Kenyatta said.

Uhuru’s appointment comes even as the country is battling with a ticking time bomb of youth unemployment.

According to the last 2017 Human Development Index (HDI), four in every 10 Kenyans of working age have no jobs, the worst level of unemployment in the region.

“This group always tends to be forgotten in the assumption that they are well off,” President Kenyatta said while urging UNICEF to also work with the government in supporting the urban and peri-urban poor in education, health and nutrition.

The meeting was attended by Cabinet Secretaries Cleopa Mailu (Health) and Amina Mohamed (Foreign Affairs).