Founder of Malawi Muslims website who is also CEO of Freelance Web Solutions Malawi Marshall Dyton is among eight Malawians that have been selected to participate in Washington Fellowship of Young African Leaders Initiative (Yali), a US President Barack Obama’s flagship exchange programme that empowers young people across Africa through academic coursework, leadership training and networking.
In an interview, Dyton said this is something he did not expect and that he feels honoured to be part of the great young Africans.
“I really feel honoured to be among 500 great young African leaders. It is something that l cannot take it for granted and l believe that it is only God who makes everything possible. This is a life changing opportunity for me and after completion of the fellowship l will try to utilise the skills gained to bring the needed change in my country and Africa at large,” he said.
“There were about 40,000 applicants from Sub-Saharan Africa but they needed only 500. In Malawi, there were more than 700 applicants and for me to be among that 8 people selected it is something I have to be proud of,” he added.
Dyton therefore advised his fellow youth to be innovative and become solutions instead of being causative agents of problems in their communities.
“They should be able to think of a problem and see how they can be a solution to that problem. For example, one of the objectives of establishing Malawi Muslims Official Website is to provide information about what Muslim individuals and organisations are doing towards the contribution of social-economic growth in country. I noticed that there was no much media coverage on Muslims’ activities in the country and only negative stories about Islam dominated different media publications which normally comes as a result of atrocities done by other people in other countries in the name of Islam. I therefore came in so as to provide a solution to that problem as well as being a communication vehicle that reduces tension between Muslims and non-Muslims in Malawi ,” said Dyton.
Apart from running the publication Dyton also has a web firm known as Freelance Web Solutions Malawi, the company which provides affordable Web and ICT services to various companies and organisations in Malawi. With a heart of giving back to the community, his firm opens for application of free web and ICT services from all organisations regardless of religious affiliations that are doing a lot to the development of the country and Africa at large.
The other seven are Madalitso Chidumu, an agri-business professional working with Self Help Africa and value chain management coordinator and also founder of social enterprice called; impact Andrew Longwe, co-founder and chief executive officer of Capital Finincial Services Tadala Thembacahako, Chancy Gondwe, a teacher who train adult literacy teachers to start their own literacy programmes using special Literacy methods designed by Literacyt International; Charles Kajoloweka, a human rights activist and founder and executive director of Youth and Soceity (YAS); Jane Jere a medical officer at Mulanje District Hospital and Yamikani Chunga, a youth leader.
According to Muhariwa the eight selected are from Blantyre, Zomba, Mangochi, Mulanje, Mzuzu and Lilongwe.
The first delegation for Mandela Washington fellowship went in July last year and had an opportunity to meet US President Barak Obama and other leaders from public, private and non-profit sectors at the presidential summit in Washington D.C
