YALI Mandela Washington Fellows To Convene In Accra

President Barack Obama’s Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) is hosting the1st Annual West Africa Regional Conference in Accra, Ghana fromApril 26-28, 2015 for Mandela Washington Fellows. The conference will bring together over 250 individuals, including the 2014 Fellows andleaders in the private sector, the U.S. Government, and international and local organizations.

Event speakers includebillionaire businessman and philanthropist Tony Elumelu;CEO of the African Women’s Development Fund, Theo Sowa; Founder of Future Africa Project, Chude Jideonwo;and the U.S. Ambassador to Ghana, Gene A. Cretz.

The topics of the conference include promoting entrepreneurship, nurturing growth sectors, inclusive development, energy, women in technology, and philanthropy in Africa.

The Mandela Washington Fellowship brings 500 young African professionals from across the continent to U.S. universities for sixweeks of leadership training in the areas of business and entrepreneurship, civic leadership, or public management. Competitively selected for this prestigious flagship program, the Fellows represent the continent’s emerging generation of entrepreneurs, community leaders, and public officials.

The West African Fellows include participants from Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Chad, Cote D’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, São Tome and Príncipe, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.

USAID and IREX support Mandela Washington Fellows with continuing professional development opportunities in Africa, to advance these young leaders along their professional leadershiptrajectories.

To find out more about the Mandela Washington Fellowship visit: https://www.irex.org/projects/yali/