CATHOLIC AFRICAN YOUTH PROMOTE GOOD GOVERNANCE AND FIGHT AGAINST CORRUPTION

Good governance and leadership, fighting corruption from the grassroots: university students from 23 countries recently converged in Arusha, Tanzania, to deliberate on these weighty issues during the 10^th Pan African Assembly of the International Movement of Catholic Students (IMCS). The assembly, held from 6 to 14 October, included observers from the USA and the Netherlands.

Topics discussed included different forms of leadership; good governance and its effects on drastic poverty reduction; corruption and its impact on the development process of Africa.  The participants in the assembly concluded that corruption is one of the worst impediments to good governance and economic development. Strategies to fight corruption and the role of students and citizens therein were also tackled.


A march was organized within the Arusha Municipality to spread the message, with students waving country flags. A statement was presented to the Church authorities on behalf of the youth and to the Minister of East African Community, Dr D. Kamala, during the closing ceremony.

At the end of the programme, the representatives drew up orientation documents to guide the process of disseminating the fruit of their discussions. This forms part of the plan of action for the next phase of the project, to be implemented at sub-regional levels and country levels.  

CJI was one of the donors of this conference. IMCS Africa said: We thank all our partners and beneficiaries for sharing in this Dream -“Our dream is not to wait till things get out of hand before we react; but to be proactive in our course… The future is bright but it depends on a solid formation of the youth today. That is why we invest in capacity building and social capital investment in general.”

The IMCS – Pax Romana brings together over 80 national federations, associations or movements of Catholic university students from six continental regions. Since 1921, IMCS has been fostering the holistic formation of students around the globe.