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Al-Sisi urges continuous communication between youth, leadership at Aswan forum Egypt facing same challenges that other African, Arab countries facing, says president
President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi said on Sunday that there must be continuous communication between the youth and the political leadership to achieve mutual awareness. He added, "It is very important to talk to each other, to listen to each other, and to believe in each other," stressing, "The aim of youth forums is to listen to you." During his speech in the opening session of the first Arab and African Youth Forum which was held under the slogan "New Horizons in Aswan", Al-Sisi said that Egypt is facing the same challenges that any other African and Arab country is facing. These challenges are political and economic, as well as overpopulation, he added, noting that raising awareness about these challenges is important to overcome them. The president added that in order to ensure the quality and readiness of our youth to lead the state institutions, "we decided to launch a presidential programme for training and rehabilitation of young people, and then we have launched the youth academy to provide the state's institutions with needed skilful youth." Furthermore, the president called upon western countries to give Egypt a share in the innovations that were invented by Egyptian minds or decrease the price of those products for Egypt. In November 2018, President Al-Sisi announced Aswan as a capital for African youth in 2019. The African and Arab Youth Forum is being held for three days in Aswan, to discuss major issues that face Arab and African youth. More than 1,500 youth are participating in the forum. Moreover, Al-Sisi met on Sunday with Moussa Faki, the chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, on the sidelines of the forum. During the meeting, Al-Sisi expressed Egypt's keenness on increasing cooperation with the AU Commission in order to augment African mutual work and serve the continent's interest. Over and above, he also referred to the importance of gathering efforts to achieve progress in the topics of the AU agenda, especially in the economic sector, regional integration, security, and international cooperation. The president stressed the importance of increasing the AU's efforts to end conflicts and reconstruct the post conflict areas. For his part, Faki asserted Egypt's important role in Africa, expressing his trust in Egypt as a president of the current round of the AU.
