Blog
Every August 12th, the world marks International Youth Day — a United Nations observance meant to recognise the role young people play in their communities and to push for greater investment in their potential. In Mwiki, where more than half the population is under 35, this isn't an abstract theme; it's the daily reality our Youth Digital Skills & Vocational Training Programme was built around. This year, we used the occasion to pause, reflect, and put the spotlight where it belongs — on the young people themselves.
Why This Day Matters Locally
International Youth Day exists partly because young people, despite making up a huge share of the population in countries like Kenya, are often underrepresented in the decisions that shape their own communities. In Mwiki, this shows up in familiar ways — youth voices sometimes missing from community barazas dominated by older residents, or economic planning that overlooks the specific barriers young jobseekers face. Marking this day is our small way of insisting that any conversation about Mwiki's future has to include the people who will actually be living in it longest.
It's also a moment to push back gently against a narrative we sometimes hear — that young people in areas like Mwiki lack ambition or discipline. Nothing in our three years of running training cohorts supports that narrative. What we consistently see is ambition meeting a shortage of accessible opportunity, not a shortage of ambition itself.
What We Did to Mark the Day
This year's observance included an open forum at the Mwiki Community Centre, where current and past trainees from our Youth Digital Skills & Vocational Training Programme spoke candidly about their journeys — the skills they built, the setbacks they faced finding early clients, and what they'd tell a younger sibling considering the same path. Rather than a formal ceremony with outside speakers, we deliberately centred the day around the young people's own voices.
We also used the day to launch informal sign-ups for our next training cohort, timing the announcement to coincide with a moment when youth engagement and visibility were already naturally high across the community.
A Few Voices From the Forum
One graduate, now doing freelance graphic design work from a shared computer space in Mwiki, spoke about the specific moment client confidence shifted for her — not when she finished the course, but when she completed her first paid project and realised strangers online would actually pay for her work. Another, now running a growing tailoring business, spoke about the mix of pride and continued financial pressure that comes with early entrepreneurship — success and struggle coexisting rather than one replacing the other.
These weren't polished, rehearsed testimonials. They were honest accounts from young people navigating a genuinely difficult economy with new tools in hand, and that honesty is exactly what made the forum valuable.
Looking Ahead With Youth at the Centre
International Youth Day comes once a year, but the commitment it represents has to hold every day in between. As we plan our programming for the remainder of 2026, we're looking specifically at how to create more structured opportunities for youth voices in our broader community needs assessment process, not just within the youth programme itself.
Mwiki's future will be shaped substantially by the young people growing up in it right now. Making sure their voices are heard clearly, not just occasionally celebrated once a year, remains one of our ongoing organisational priorities.
Why Representation in Local Decision-Making Still Lags
Despite days like this drawing attention to youth potential, meaningful representation in local decision-making structures remains genuinely limited across many communities, including parts of Mwiki. Barazas and community consultations, while open in principle to all residents, often skew toward older, more established voices simply through patterns of who has traditionally attended and who feels comfortable speaking up in that setting. Changing this pattern requires more than an annual observance — it requires deliberate, ongoing effort to create spaces where younger residents feel their input carries genuine weight.
We're conscious that our own organisation, despite running youth-focused programming, needs to keep examining whether young people have real influence over our broader organisational decisions, not just within the youth programme itself. This is an area of honest ongoing reflection rather than a problem we consider solved simply because we run youth programming at all.
An Invitation Beyond a Single Day
If International Youth Day has prompted you to think more seriously about youth voice and opportunity in your own part of Mwiki, we'd encourage turning that reflection into something concrete — attending a community baraza and specifically listening for whether younger residents are speaking up, mentoring a young person informally, or simply asking a young family member what barriers they feel stand between them and the opportunities they want. Days like this matter most when they translate into ordinary, everyday attention the other 364 days of the year.
If you're a young person in Mwiki interested in the next Youth Digital Skills & Vocational Training Programme cohort, or if you'd like to support youth-focused programming through partnership or donation, reach us at info@onevisioncbo.site or +254 798 200890.