The United Nations is running a global online survey titled My World that is open to people from across the world to vote on what development issues are of priority to them as the next Millennium Development goals are being developed. The UN High Level Panel for Post 2015 is relying on this survey to determine the development goals for the next 15 year period and it is important for Africa and especially African Youth to make their voice heard. So far there has been very limited response from Africa on the survey and there is a risk for us that the development goals might not address those issues that are priority to us, our countries and our communities.

Our participation is important as we add our voice to a larger global process and this is also urgent as we only have less than 3 weeks before the results are presented to the High Level Panel for Post 2015. This is therefore our call to you to make your voice heard and to mobilise the young people in your networks to make their input. The online survey can be accessed through this link http://www.myworld2015.org/index.html. You can mobilise people to vote in the following ways

1.Posting the link on your Facebook Pages, Websites and any other social media available to you
2.Sharing the link during your Act2Live and other Radio Shows
3.During the youth meetings (Peer Educators, young advocates, youth council etc) you can organize to have a computer with internet accessible to members present to allow them to vote.
4.Encourage the YMCA/YWCA youth to mobilise their friends and relatives to participate

Participation in the survey takes only 5 Minutes. Attached is a presentation with more information about this campaign.

I made my voice heard and I urge you to make your voice heard too.

Source: Purity Kiguatha, AAYMCA

This is one report to which everyone must pay very close attention. The New York Times described it, 'The Plunder Must Stop!'

It has been a long held view, and rightly so, that indeed Africa is probably the most endowed place on earth with natural and mineral resources of all sorts, yet it is also one of the most backward places laden with poverty, diseases, conflicts, and ignorance. In fact, Kwame Nkrumah had said that if the resources of Africa were used for Africa, it would have been one of the most advanced places on earth!

What then has been the problem? In this report the issue of governance has been highlighted strongly, coupled with cooperation from the international government as necessary conditions to ensure that the resources of Africa benefit Africans. So far, our resources are a major driver of growth around the world, far beyond what they are providing to Africa itself.

The Africa Progress Report is produced by the Africa Progress Panel led by Kofi Annan and leading policy leaders around the world.

You can click on the following links to read the Africa Progress Report and the Summary of the April 2013 report.

Source: Joseph Taiwo Peacock, Deputy National General Secretary, The Gambia YMCA

“Do you believe you can change the world?” asked Norwegian Minister of International Development, Heikki Holmas to a 300-strong crowd, mainly comprising youth from both Norway and those on exchange programmes, at the Fredskorpset Youth Conference on 27 February in Oslo, Norway.

He was met with a resounding “yes” by the youth, who all cheered and shouted enthusiastically. Sharing the podium with him were other illustrious speakers, including His Royal Highness Crown Prince Haakon of Norway, who opened the event.

“You are the present. You are the now. You need to be listened to now!” And listen we did, to the stars of the day: the Young Peace Performers (YPP). A group of 15 youth from 7 different countries, these youth delivered a strong message:

• A peaceful and just world is possible through global solidarity

• We can eradicate absolute poverty by 2030

The YPP group of 15 youth from 7 countries have travelled through Kenya, Tanzania and now Norway advocating for justice and peace. The YPP is done in partnership with Y Global Norway, through Fredskorpset, the national agency tasked with youth exchanges. Africa Alliance has a partnership with Y Global, whereby we have two S2C Ambassadors on the exchange, whose role it is to run S2C workshops in the communities. Other partners are Kenya YMCA and YWCA, Tanzania YWCA, Sudan YMCA, Sri Lanka YMCA, Joint Advocacy Initiative (JAI) of East Jerusalem YMCA and Palestine YWCA.

As YPP coordinators, we spent the next few days evaluating the current programme, and planning for the upcoming 2013/14 programme which focuses on Palestine, and also tours Jordan and Norway.
Some questions we asked ourselves and encourage you to ask in your youth exchanges:

• How does the youth exchange influence the individual participants to work for a more just world?

• What type of interventions at a local level can a youth exchange have and how do we ensure these are sustainable?

Gil Harper, International and Corporate Affairs, Africa Alliance of YMCAs

Source: World Alliance of YMCAs

Leaders of African YMCAs converged in hot, hot Bagbe, Togo, this week for the Annual National General Secretaries’ Seminar. Under the theme, “Membership: The main resource and asset of the YMCA”, the NGSs have engaged in discussions to review progress in national movements, share learnings and consolidate a way forward for renewed impact across the continent.

It was amazing to hear the progress on resource mobilisation since we all met last year. Across Africa, different national movements have engaged and partnered with government, banks, oil companies, cell phone providers and retailers. We were quick to recognise the need to profile our corporate partnerships to ensure visibility and credibility of the YMCAs are increased, instead of focusing only on profiling our programme and leadership impact.

There was much discussion on membership and we went right back to the fundamentals in understanding who a member is, as this differs from movement to movement. From this we shared various strategies in attracting and retaining members. At the end of this session, we emerged with a strategy framework for membership development. It is now for national movements who do not have membership development strategies, to ensure that this is done by end July.

Next up we deliberated on and endorsed the S2C Franchising model which aims to increase the number of young people who take part in a structured, incremental S2C training and participation programme and hence the impact of S2C at individual and organisation level from the local to global arenas.

Ahead of us are a practical session on IT and a more in-depth look at resource mobilisation, before we are joined by the Board Chairs for a joint session until the end of the week.