President Uhuru Kenyatta on stage with students of Mbale High School during the Winners’ Concert at State House Nakuru.
By Jerry Abuga
The decision to sponsor the festivals was informed by the fact that it is an opportunity to educate young people about the same important socio-economic issues that 2jiajiri seeks to address.
KCB Foundation, through its flagship youth empowerment and employment programme, extended a KES 7,000,000 sponsorship towards this year’s Kenya Music Festivals held at Kabarak University in Nakuru County from Saturday, 3rd to Thursday, 15th August, 2019 under the auspices of the Ministry of Education.
2jiajiri was a theme throughout the festivals with the top-ranked schools from the counties converging to compete at the national event.
Over 51 special compositions on 2jiajiri by early childhood education learners, primary and secondary schools, technical training institutes, national polytechnics, the National Youth Service, teachers training colleges and universities qualified for the nationals.
The institutions staged scintillating plays, poems, songs and dances around 2jiajiri initiatives that develop a new cadre of youthful entrepreneurs in the informal sector to ease the country’s unemployment crisis through our support to the various informal trades: agribusiness, automotive engineering, beauty and personal care, building and construction and domestic services.
The culmination of the festivals was a Winners’ Concert officiated by H.E President Uhuru Kenyatta on Wednesday, 14th August 2019 at the Nakuru State House. The State concert had 29 winners across all categories, among them Mbale High School from Western that emerged top overall in the secondary schools category with a Swahili song rallying the youth to utilise the various opportunities under the 2jiajiri programme.
KCB Nakuru Main branch Manager Christine Keter (right) presents the KES 7 million KCB Foundation sponsorship to the Kenya Music Festivals Executive Secretary Ruth Agesa.
Other institutions that aptly captured and delivered the 2jiajiri message through sturdily choreographed poems and songs included Bishop Gatimu Ngandu Girls High School, Makueni Girls High School, Laboret Boys High School, Mwakitawa Girls and Tengecha Girls in the seconday schools category. Egerton University, Kisumu Polytechnic, Wote Technical Training Institute, Sigalagala Technical Training Institute and Mathenge National Polytechnic triumphed in the tertiary institutions category.
The two-week festival attracted over 130,000 participants who included students, teachers and education officials from Kenya and East Africa, development partners, national and county governments and the general public.
KCB Foundation Managing Director Jane Mwangi said the decision to sponsor the festivals was informed by the fact that it is an opportunity to educate young people about the same important socio-economic issues that 2jiajiri seeks to address.
“Our aim is to influence culture at the nascent age all through to adulthood by inculcating the spirit of entrepreneurship through songs, poems and drama. By adulthood, these students will have entrepreneurship as the default thinking as opposed to job seeking. We are re-setting the mindsets of our youth,” said Ms Mwangi.
Since its launch in 2016, 2jiajiri has skilled over 25,000 youth beneficiaries on technical skills and financial literacy across the country.
