BY MBONGENI NDLELA
MBABANE – Thank you and goodbye.
UNDP Resident Representative Rose Ssebatindira on Saturday bade farewell to His Majesty King Mswati III at Lozitha Royal Palace. This happened during the sidelines of the 2023 End-of-year Prayer Service. Ssebatindira, a Ugandan National, leaves Eswatini after four years of service in the Kingdom, having arrived on May 1, 2019.
Since her arrival, she has been instrumental in demonstrating UNDP’s offer and relevance to the Kingdom’s priorities through a number of innovative projects focused on inclusive growth, governance and peacebuilding, and environment and climate change mitigation.
According to UNDP Eswatini, one of Ssebatindira’s legacy projects in the Kingdom is the Eswatini Youth Empowerment Programme (EYEP). This project was launched by His Majesty King Mswati III, on 10 November 2022. In fact, EYEP was a result of a partnership between UNDP, the private sector, and tertiary institutions. This Programme supports young graduates between 18 to 35 years old to gain work experience, skills, and access to jobs. It also reaches out to young people with little or no tertiary education for training on entrepreneurship for business start-ups. It was endorsed by the Government with the aim to address youth unemployment through five pillars.
“In partnership with the government and private sector, 200 unemployed graduates have since been placed under EYEP with over 46 organizations for 6-month paid internships, and 90 artisan youth have been trained and equipped with tools to start small businesses in their communities,” states UNDP.
