Emmanuel Odama, an Associate Pastor of Agape Christian Fellowship Arua stunned scores of young entrepreneurs from across African that had gathered for the Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) in Washington last evening.
Emmanuel Odama was selected to introduce President Obama who was expected to address YALI, answer any questions and get comments and ideas from the young leaders.
Started in 2010, YALI has brought hundreds of thousands of young people across the continent together to make their communities, countries, and continent more prosperous and secure.
When introducing USA president Barak Obama, Emmanuel, who is an agricultural scientist said that the African continent is not only in need of transformational leaders, but leaders who will make the deliberate effort to inspire those they lead to take up the mantle — particularly young leaders, who are looking for seasoned role models to emulate.
Pr Emmanuel said that his passion is to be a part of bringing solutions to Uganda.
“First of all, I want to thank Emmanuel for the great introduction and the outstanding work on behalf of the people of Uganda. Please give Emmanuel a big round of applause. I don’t know whether they chose Emmanuel because he’s such a great speaker — which he is — or because they thought he and I were cousins — (laughter) — because Odama, Obama — (laughter) — there must be some connection,” President Obama Stated
“And we’re doing this not just because I love the people of Africa, but also because the world will not be able to deal with climate change or terrorism, or expanding women’s rights — all the issues that we face globally — without a rising and dynamic and self-reliant Africa. And that, more importantly than anything else, depends on a rising generation of new leaders. It depends on you. ”
Courtesy of the USA white House: Watch the proceedings here:
https://youtu.be/iUS3m78MRbs
