• Ms Ahunna Eziakonwa, Assistant Administrator and Director of the Regional Bureau for UNDP Africa
• Distinguished Ladies and gentleman
• Young women of the 2^nd cohort of the African Young Women Leaders Fellowship Programme,

Warm greetings and welcome to Addis Ababa.

Today you begin your journey as ambassadors of a program that was designed to unleash the potential of Africa’s youth. In my remarks today I want to emphasize to you why it is important that you are sitting where you are.

• Women and youth constitute 75% of the African continent population.
• More than 70% of African women and youth are financially excluded.
• There is a USD 42 billion financing gap facing women in Africa.

Given these 3 reasons, there is an overwhelming need for each and every one of you in this room today to unleash your potential.

This is why in 2019 H.E. Moussa Faki Mahamat, the Chairperson of the African Union Commission launched the 1 Million by 2021 Initiative.  The 1^st cohort in 2019 was among our earliest beneficiaries of the 1 Million by 2021 initiative, you follow in their impressive footsteps and become beneficiaries of two AUC initiatives; the first is the 1 Million Next Level Initiative, which succeeds 1 Million by 2021 and the second is the AU Women and Youth Financial and Economic Inclusion Initiative (WYFEI 2030).

Through the WYFEI 2030, the AUC seeks to unlock opportunities for women and youth, scale up women and youth financial and economic inclusion through advocating for parity in employment.

The vision of the program is to enhance engagement spaces of young African women, to place them on a sturdy ladder that they can climb with relative ease.

The prestigious African Young Women Leaders Fellowship seeks to increase the income of women and youth through advocating for parity in employment – which is at the centre of the WYFEI.

The status of women in Africa is personal to me. What I want you all to understand is that I am who I am today because of the people in my community;

Investing in women is not a vanity project for the Commission, it is urgent and important. Our job as duty bearers is to lead the charge in the implementation of women and youth-centric economic policies and programmes, that will create an enabling environment for all of you. Your job is to ensure that none of those efforts are in vain.

The fellowship programme is illustrative of commitment by our respective institutions to empower and invest in Africa’s biggest demographic. I extend gratitude to UNDP for the continued partnership and I look forward to scaling up the partnership through both the WYFEI and 1 million initiatives and emerging initiatives such as the African Youth Exchange Initiative.

I personally commit to spearhead the African Youth Women Leaders Programme and the Africa Youth Exchange Programme as part of the delivery of the WYFEI 2030.

I congratulate you on being selected for this prestigious Fellowship and wish you all the best.

I thank you.