Global Peace Youth – Kenya Raising a U-Generation

Eric Olsen
April 17, 2013

In March, GPYC-Kenya launched U-Generation for university students across Kenya. U-Generation stands for “United Generation” and is an initiative to build a global network of moral and innovative young leaders who will lead a united Kenya and a peaceful world.

GPYC Kenya new U-Generation members initiation

The successful presidential elections in Kenya demonstrated the importance of leadership that is guided by a vision that transcends tribal and even national bounds. GPF was recognized as key contributor to the peaceful elections, including its role in hosting the first ever National Youth Summit that engaged youth from all newly established counties in Kenya to promote peace during the elections. The summit also allowed youth leaders in dialogue about pressing issues of employment, civic participation, volunteerism and development.

After the recent U-Generation training program at the Kenyan Wildlife Club, Oyange Wasonga Mzalendo commented on Facebook, “The U-Gen theme of “One Human Family” is not a simple slogan but a core defining value, wherein young people of all walks of life and ethnic background recognize a common, human identity, and therefore a basis for respect and accommodation.”

More than fifty years ago, when the fight for Kenyan independence raged, leaders like Jomo Kenyatta and Tom Mboya realized the same, that to create a viable Kenya, they would have to see past tribal differences, and even Kenyan interests, to seek a Pan-African and even global vision. Dr. King famously stated in his welcoming remarks for Tom Mboya at the Africa Freedom Dinner at Atlanta University, “Our struggle is not an isolated struggle…We are not sitting here detached, as I said, but we are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.”

Mr. Mboya’s initiative to send Kenyan University students to America to study, left a lasting impact. In the United States his presence opened inroads for the Civil Rights Movement to connect to President Kennedy’s administration. For Kenya, it raised a generation of educated and motivated leaders, including Nobel laureate Wangari Maatha and the late Vice President George Saitoti.

GPYC is raising and connecting the next generation of Kenyan leaders to a time tested understanding, that leadership and moral authority is determined by the size of the dream the leader dreams. The U-Generation is motivate by a universal dream that encompasses all humanity in an “inescapable network of mutuality.”

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