Pt. 4: In Their Own Words: 4 Young People at the Abuja Conference

Haben Fecadu, 22
International Program Coordinator, Advocates for Youth
Washington D.C., USA

I came for the advocacy perspective. It is great to come here and learn all the empirical evidence that we can use in our advocacy. A lot of the presentations have to do with reproductive health and focus on young people. There are so many. At one panel I went to a woman presented on a slum in Nairobi, Kenya. They are doing work and including young people. It was backed up with empirical evidence, and it worked well. It really did involve young people doing work. It was a program for girls, and alumni would go and replicate what they learned. It was youth empowerment and it addressed the needs of females there. They formed groups and worked with schools to delay marriage. That was great, the fact they actually had positive results. This is something you can cite when you actually incorporate young people [who] were doing some of the work themselves.

[Researchers] are obviously trying to understand young people. You can’t really complain when they are making a huge effort in conferences like this and valuing our opinion and trying to make things as youth friendly as possible.

Interview by Brian W. Simpson, editor of Johns Hopkins Public Health magazine.