Zimbabwe will host a four-day festival to celebrate the Africa Youth Day in Mutare, a city bordered with Mozambique. The festivities will run from Friday to Monday. The day was set aside by the African Union and is celebrated on November 1 annually. Over 300 participants, including Youth Ministers and leaders from the SADC (the Southern African Development Community) region and other African countries are expected to attend, according to reports by The Herald on Friday. Zimbabwe Youth Council chairperson Donald Charumbira said in a statement that the celebrations would be held in recognition of youths' contributions to continental development.
Zimbabwean youth leaders will use the occasion to learn from other countries' experiences as part of the review of the National Youth Policy.
Charumbira said "The years 2009 to 2018 have been declared the decade for youth development and empowerment by the African Union. This declaration was guided by the need to strengthen the capacity of youth in the region and to ensure that they are empowered so that they can catalyse development on the African continent."
He said the objectives of the festival include sharing best practices on regional youth programming and determining sub- regional implementation modalities for the decade of youth development.
Delegates are expected to visit Chimoio in Mozambique.