Photo/Video Competition Virtual Awards Ceremony Report

The Youth Café conducted a virtual video/photo award ceremony on the 23rd of September 2021. The event was broadcasted live on our YouTube and Facebook pages. The theme of the project was to “capture your reality of corruption and governance”. Several key players attended including our participants, members of The Youth Café, members of the public and our keynote speaker, Mr. Samuel Kimeu, the Executive Director of Africa’s Voices Foundation. 

The event began with our Communications, Advocacy and Digital Engagement Associate, Malika Pyarali, engaging the attendees in a conversation, on the chat room, on what they could do if they had the power to change one thing in the world. What exciting projects are you currently working on? As well as what are your expectations from today's awards ceremony? A Padlet was also shared in the chat room with 5 questions posed to the attendees. Their views were later shared on the platform by our Research Associate, David Mugambi. 

After this, our Volunteer Matikweni Khoza gave an overview of The Youth Café and what we are all about as well as an overview of our vision and mission and how The Youth Café engages in making a difference. She highlighted how The Youth Café is a unique youth initiative in Africa that seeks to foster community resilience, propose innovative solutions, drive social progress, youth empowerment and inspire political change in Africa, how it is a mobilizing force that achieves results in partnerships with governments, international organizations, religious, United Nations, civil society groups, corporations, youth and foundations, how it is a creative amplifying laboratory in Africa that seeks to advocate and foster innovative, impactful and progressive policies that promote youth participation and engagement as well as how The Youth Café, is a convener facilitating inclusive, accessible and empowering digital and physical spaces for youth to meaningfully engage with different institutions through supporting.

Later on, a screening of an animated 2D video depicting our Theory of Change. The Theory of Change was devised as a roadmap to help guide us as we strive to meaningfully impact society. It is a pathway for action, sustainability, results, learning, and adaptation. It highlights our eight focus areas, which are:

• Peace and Security

• Governance and Political Inclusion (Remittances)

• Governance and Political Inclusion (Accountability)

• Culture, Arts and Sports

• Education and Skills

• Business, Job creation and Entrepreneurship

• Universal Health Coverage

• Environmental preservation, and Climate Change.

Soon after, the Senior Research and Project Management Officer, Synthia Ontita gave a brief overview of the project, on engaging youth in the fight against corruption and closing civic space. She highlighted that the 2-year project was funded by Ford Foundation, The Youth Café in collaboration with Open Governance Institute and People Powered, aim to build the power of young Kenyans to impact government policies, uphold their rights, and fight against corruption and the closing civic space, by strengthening evidence-based advocacy for accountability, critical thinking and media skills, and collaboration among state and youth organizations.

Interventions include; 

• Developing clear county transparency and accountability ratings, using data from audit reports and policy frameworks to economic empowerment programmes. This can be done through, gaining access to government procedure opportunities and enterprise funds. This, in turn, gives accessible accountability information and media content on policy

• Deepening media coverage of government devolution and public finance management issues affecting young people. This can further be enhanced by the adoption of critical thinking of young people, increased access to media opportunities through secure digital platforms and innovations.

• Accessing the state of coalition and potential of governance reform in organizations looking at state and non-state actors working together to synthesize available resources for greater impact on county transparency initiatives.

• After the Covid-19 policy, The Youth Café adopted a lockdown live series of webinars aimed at strengthening engagement with young people and amplifying their voices and actions in supporting the expansion of civil space and advancing civic engagement.  

The photo/video contest was a step taken by The Youth Café with 5 goals in mind, namely;

• To create awareness of corruption and the closing civic space in Kenya.

• To start conversations on corruption and ways to mitigate it.

• To reflect on how we contribute to the corruption statistics in Kenya.

• To elevate the voices of the youth in the matter.

• To use art as a creative medium to mitigate corruption.

Where contestants between the ages of 18-35 took part to represent their scenario of corruption, with the winner bagging 600 dollars, the first runner up 400 dollars and the second runner up 200 dollars. This approach was to take advantage of the interconnectedness we enjoy today through technology and to inspire corruption storytelling.

Storytelling through photos and videos will create awareness, increase activism, and educate youth to take positive steps towards good governance. We seek representations of people’s scenarios in this context, presented in authentic ways. We also expect to learn more about corruption in Kenya through the photo and video submissions.

Then, the padlet was posed to attendees where they shared their experience with corruption with one attendee sighting that while he tried to help a student of his get an internship at a county government, he was asked to give a bribe for the position to be filled. He, however, did not bribe and does not intend to do so in future.    

Next, a music video was played dubbed ‘Vijana Hawana Wera’ by a group of young talented artists from Kariobangi whom we work with to create videos that convey the feelings and opinions of young people on the negative effects of corruption.  Later videos of the participants talking about their efforts in combating corruption were played where we heard their views about corruption in Kenya and possible solutions.

We then had another padlet activity that opened up an honest discussion on what we think as young people, can leverage our numbers, skills and talents to actively participate in the fight against corruption. Attendees raised their hands and shared their thoughts live and through the chat room. Some of the attendees were of the view that we as young people need to get to positions of power where we can influence change in an impactful way. In the chat room, attendees discussed politics and corruption citing we needed leaders who are strong-willed and that a nation in fear cannot move forward.  

Moving on, a brief background on the timelines of the competition was given where the entries were judged by professionals in the fields of photography, journalism, public relations as well as social leaders. Photographs were judged on relevance to the contest theme, power of the message, creativity, technical quality and suitability for presentation to an international audience. The photo and video contest reached over 500,000 young people and attracted hundreds of entries. From the entries, 14 entrants were selected to proceed to the final stage.

Later on, the profiles of the 3 winners were presented with a brief summary of their experience with corruption as well as their inspiration and what they would do with the award. In 3rd place was Boniface Munene who has seen first-hand how corruption has affected the lives of youth in his community. With first-hand experience in corruption, where he was once been given a chance for a scholarship but through corruption, he was unable to grab the opportunity as he was asked for a bribe. This has fueled his passion for change and he vowed to improve the new studio that in turn will help him create more creative Images to educate and earn a living. He would also like to venture into editorial photography and this award will really help give him a start.

In 2nd place was Brian Odhiambo who is deeply enthusiastic about eradicating corruption in Kenya and believes the right way to start recognizing heroic integrity and honest acts is to motivate clean ethical records. He also faced corruption first-hand where he was locked out of an enumerator position because he couldn't bribe my way to the job. He felt very bitter and detached from this country at that point because my dreams crashed after high expectations. He intends to invest in professional audio-visual music with lyrical content condemning corruption since he is a performing rapper. The songs would also be melodious for the likeness of those who don't pay attention to lyrics, the end result is for the songs to be catchy and educative.

Finally, our winner in 1st place was Damaris Aswa, a community integrity building ambassador, who is actively engaged in fighting corruption through behavioural change among the youth. She has successfully trained over 100 teachers and over 1500 students on community integrity building. Through her initiative, over 50 infrastructure and service projects have been successfully monitored to completion. Some stalled projects have so far been revived as these monitors hold various duty bearers accountable.

Damaris is currently training social accountability youth committees on accountability during the COVID-19 pandemic. She is keen on determining how government initiatives such as cash transfers, relief food, and the reopening of schools have been /are being conducted. She intends to use the award to fund the integrity project (SHINE) and increase the level of activity and interaction with hundreds of students on accountability. That means that increased lessons and practical classes will be organized for the students to facilitate learning. The integrity clubs through the project would also be strengthened through the Award.

We were then honoured with an inspiring keynote address from Mr. Samuel Kimeu. In his opening remarks, he sighted that there is an overall reward in investing in the current and future of our society. That corruption has been embedded into African countries since independence and has grown to a level that threatens our very existence as a state and as a continent our ability to progress and meet the basic necessities of our people.

He was also of the view that young people have the knowledge, technology access and the advantage of the world as a global village as well as the numbers to make impactful change. Mr. Kimeu stated that, as young people, our access to time, energy and clearer headspace as well as our receptivity to social change and political transformation, equip us better to deliberately quest for better governance and a value system we can be proud of. That for change to happen young people need to work together and gather the courage to do so.

Mr. Kimeu further stated that there is an insufficiency of official truth, limiting information provision the use of public funds and that it is an obstacle we will keep experiencing due to a culture of keeping official secrets in the name of the government. The youth have used some tools to try and mobilize each other i.e. Integrity/ democracy camps, Summer schools that teach the knowledge and mechanics of anti-corruption, Development or curricula to educate people and students within the school system about corruption, Setting up of integrity clubs in many learning institutions, Awareness-raising campaigns targeting young people and people in school. He concluded by stating that, we should create platforms for harnessing voices and to use the platforms to influence change in legislation and be unselfish in defending our country as Dedan Kimathi did. 

Finally, the attendees were invited to ask any questions/comments they had whether to our keynote speaker or The Youth Café, a lot of congratulatory remarks were given to the winners as well as an appreciation for the keynote speaker was posted in the chat room and read out loud. The event ended with a thank you to all in attendance and a group photo.   

The Youth Café works with young men and women around Africa as a trailblazer in advancing youth-led approaches toward achieving sustainable development, social equity, innovative solutions, community resilience and transformative change.

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