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Striving for gender parity is key in our efforts at rebuilding broken communities.
Bright Light Projects (BLP) has launched a livelihood program for young men in Bamenda, the North West Region of Cameroon called Young Men entrepreneurship (YME). Our flagship program Girls Shall Rise (GSR) has been a hallmark for success providing a transformative platform for young vulnerable girls in deprived communities in Sierra Leone and Cameroon. The GSR and YME are all steps towards a bigger program that is the creation of a Bright Light Projects Empowerment Centre in Cameroon and in Sierra Leone.
The focus of the YME program is on Skills development, entrepreneurship, and mentorship for Young men ages 18 – 25. The program is also aimed at providing second chance education and reintegration of young men into society torn apart by varying difficulties. Under the project titled, “Young Men Entrepreneurship” (YME), the beneficiaries will be trained on vocational skills including but not limited to glass cutting, motorbike mechanics and electricians, fashion designing, agriculture, catering, barbing, driving, wood work, and a host of others to provide a sustainable future for these young men who have been heavily affected by the ongoing armed conflict in the North West and South West Regions of Cameroon.
Bright Light Projects launched this project on 29 August 2023 in Bamenda, the North West Region of Cameroon and a number of young men are currently being trained. According to the Program Assistant of BLP, Praise Wandia, it is time to engage in a holistic gender mainstreaming taking into consideration all gender and their specific needs. He reiterated that the aim of the training is to get young men between 18 to 25 years in vocational training centers of their choice. According to Charles Lontum, the Project Development Chair of BLP, this training program for young men is a proactive approach to safeguard gains made towards gender equality because it will enable beneficiaries to become stakeholders in promoting gender equality. “They become ambassadors of empowerment of girls and young women, to provide for the necessary cultural shifts of male dominance dismantling customary and institutional laws that have promoted gender inequality for so long”.
During the launch of this program, Mr. Wirndzerem Gideon Barfee, the CEO of URUNMILA VOCATIONAL TRAINING CENTRE donated a computer to the the Bright Light Projects IT center. This gesture was welcomed with much appreciation by the management.
The selection process is through a rigorous vulnerability assessment mechanism by staff of BLP in different communities to select and prepare beneficiaries. To ensure beneficiaries get the best skills in their chosen disciplines, BLP has signed special memoranda of understanding with different training centers where the beneficiaries will be undertaking training for the next 12 months to become self-reliant and contribute positively to the development of their communities.
During the launch of this program on 29 August, Lum Innocentia, representative of the Regional Delegate of Employment and Vocational Training, “…this project will help ensure that every young boy or girl should be trained so that they become self-reliant, self-employed, so that they should not be job seekers but job makers”. According to Eric Tchemda Ngacho, representing the Secretary General of the North West Regional Assembly, while speaking to the press expressed his appreciation for the initiative and its potential impact on the beneficiaries as he reiterated that the project was going to transform minds and cause the youths to be innovative creative and assume the risks of business ventures.
One of the beneficiaries of YME, Achambo Franco expressed with happiness his participation as he promised to put in his best effort. He further thanked the BLP while saying that the opportunity was going to create an impact in his life.
The YME Project adds to other flagship projects towards the creation of a BLP Empowerment Centre to empower vulnerable young men and women in Cameroon, Sierra Leone and other operational countries.
BLP will be hosting its 2023 Annual Fundraising Gala in Houston, Texas on Saturday November 18, 2023. A time for us to renew our commitment to our beneficiaries, partners, community stakeholders. The Theme for this year is the BLP Empowerment Center as a gateway to sustainability for our beneficiaries and programs.
Get Your Tickets BLP 2023 Annual Fundraising Gala
https://www.vipsocio.com/.../bright-light-projects-2023...
Read BLP’s 2023 Annual Fundraising Gala Concept Notes
https://brightlightprojects.org/blp-2023-annual.../
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