The Foundations for Africa's Future Leadership Project is a joint UNDP/UNESCO project based at UNESCO office in Dakar, Senegal. It is a regional project that is intended to gradually cover the whole of the African continent overtime. Its main objective is to address the leadership problem in Africa by laying the foundations for developing a new breed of committed and responsible leaders across all spectrum and segments of society (in government, business, educational institutions, research, innovation, etc). The Primary Beneficiaries of the project are African university students within and outside the continent, and young professionals recently joining the labour market; while the Secondary Beneficiaries will consist of targeted leaders from the public and private sectors, NGOs and civil society organizations as well as academic institutions. It will cover an 18 months period and result in a full Africa wide programme by mid 2005.

The project provides leadership training to the Primary beneficiaries and will then expose them to practical leadership challenges by placing them on a two-month internship attachment with regional related national programmes; sub-regional and regional organizations and programmes. The purpose of the internship is to give the participants an opportunity to experience, first hand, development issues and problems that such organizations deal with and to take part in addressing and resolving those problems facing the continent. The Secondary beneficiaries will receive leadership training only that will, in addition to leadership skills, cover substantive issues of Africa's economic development (democracy and good governance, millennium development goals, education for all, WTO, HIV/AIDS, etc), relevant to their individual areas of interest through dialogue with current leaders and development partners.

The first phase of the project began in March 2004, and will continue for the next eighteen months until September 2005. The second phase will begin in October 2005. The plan during the first phase is to accomplish the following:

To date, the project enjoys the participation and/or support of development partners such as the University of Bradford (Africa Center for Peace and Conflict Studies), United Kingdom; University for Peace (Africa Programme), Geneva; Africa University (Institute for Peace, Leadership and Governance), Mutare, Zimbabwe; United Nations Volunteer Programme - Bonn; Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA); Mindolo Ecumenical Foundation (Zambia); Common Market for Eastern and Souther Africa (COMESA); Africa Leadership Forum (ALF); and the African Training and Research Centre in Administration and Development (CAFRAD). Countries participating in the first phase include Senegal, Mali, Ghana, Nigeria and Sierra Leone in West Africa; Cameroon and DRC Congo in the Central; Zambia, Zimbabwe and Swaziland in the South; and Kenya and Uganda in East Africa.

The project complements the human resource capacity building efforts of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) on the continent, and further explore strategies, through peace and conflict management training, for establishing peace in the different regions of Africa. It is worth noting that a couple of years back the project training expert conducted, at the instance of UNDP Nigeria, training for young people in the violent prone Niger Delta region of the country.

The project is officially launched today 17 June 2004 by the Director of UNESCO-BREDA, Mr. A. Parsuramen and the Resident Representative, a.i of UNDP, Ms. Diene Keita, in the presence of the Director of Cabinet of the Minister of Education, Mr. Joseph Pierre Ndiaye and the UN system agencies as well as other distinguished representatives from higher education organizations in Senegal and relevant NGOs, civil society groups and the private sector.

Three months after its commencement, the project has recorded achievements such as the establishment of the project secretariat and bringing on board the project team; the conduct of the stock taking exercises in Nigeria, Senegal, Kenya, Sierra Leone, and Ghana; the provision of leadership training to Secondary Beneficiaries in Nigeria and Ghana; establishment of operational linkages with various organizations around the continent; resource mobilization and finalising plans for the conduct of training and internship placements for Primary Beneficiaries in July and August at GIMPA and Africa University in Mutare, Zimbabwe.

In closing the meeting of the International Advisory Panel, Mr. Joseph Pierre Ndiaye, Cabinet Director of the Minister of Education reiterated the importance of the Project for Africa and how delighted he was that such an endeavor was taking place in Africa. He emphasized the fact that this launching was a crucial turning point that must not be missed. He went on to say that this Project will add value to successful education in Africa. He invited once again, every African citizen to partake in responding to the Leadership problématique on the continent. He then, extended his gratitude to all persons - wherever they may be- who are involved in this initiative.

Finally, Mr. Ndiaye, on behalf of the Senegalese Government, formally launched the Joint UNDP-UNESCO Project Foundations for Africa's Future Leadership.