Rabiatou Ceesay, a youth in her early 20s, has been declared winner of The Gambia's version of the African Youth and Creativity Awards (AYICA) 2009, after making a swaying presentation alongside three other competitors, before a select group of National Assembly members who served as the judges.

This leaves her as the country's representative at the continental final of the competition which is slated for 25-29 July 2009, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. AYICA is a continental idea that emerged alongside the adoption, in July 2nd 2006, of the first ever youth charter prepared by Africa's leaders for the youth of the continent. The sole aim of the award is to popularise the stipulates of this charter and to  encourage the young people to assume the leadership role required from them to have the continental leaders take necessary actions for its eventual ratification.

According to the Gambia National Youth Council's executive secretary, Marcel Mendy, about 20  Gambian youth who matched the criteria for participation in the competition submitted their entries to the Council, and the ''best four entries received from Rabiatou Ceesay, a student at the University of Ghana,  the eventual winner; Ansumana Darboe, another university student, who is in fact the students' union president at the University of The Gambia (UTG); Lamin J Gassama, vice chairperson of Western Region Youth Committee, who is also the president of the Law Students' Association of The Gambia Technical Training Institute (GTTI); and a younger, but rather determined Aji Mariama Senghore, a grade 11 student at St. Joseph's Senior Secondary School.

By all standards, all four finalists did well in terms of the way they put across their ideas about the charter and their vision as to its adoption. Rabiatou, like the rest of the contenders,  clearly went through pains, convincing her audience as to the abilities and capacities of the African youth in terms of our readiness to take over as responsible leaders. But she believes that this can only be possible if the youth are provided with the necessary tools. ''We just need this charter to channel all our energy to the right direction,''  she said. She argued  that the charter will provide the youth folks of the continent "a set for our voices to be heard and something to be done.''

If, as in Rabiatou's assertion, the youth folk constitute over 50% of the continent's population, it is indeed suicidal to ignore a formidable group as important as this. This is what makes it all the more fundamental that calls by the youth are heeded and dealt with in the most genuine of intentions. Adoption and ratification of the youth charter are just two steps towards implementation, but not clearly indicative enough of total submission by state parties.

Come to think about it, however, there is absolutely no reason whatsoever for anyone to entertain the feeling that the continental leaders would have expended so much precious time and effort only to add one more document to their collection of treaties for mere documentation. The youth of Africa hope that this charter ushers in a new dawn for them in the interest of generations to come. One point is worth remembering though, as Rabiatou said, ''African youth are far too important to be marginalised.''