Latifa bint Muhammad witnesses the work "Young Arab Leaders Forum"

DUBAI, 2nd February, 2018 (WAM) – Her Highness Sheikha Latifa bint Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Chairwoman of the Dubai Culture and Arts Authority, today witnessed the work of the “Young Arab Leadership Forum” as part of the activities of the preliminary day of the “World Government Summit 2026” in Dubai, with the participation of leading and prominent Arab figures in various fields of economics, entrepreneurship, government leadership, sports creativity, culture, and the arts.

The forum’s agenda included several main and dialogue sessions with the participation of 15 speakers who reviewed the reality of Arab youth and their promising opportunities in the future, in addition to highlighting the most prominent current challenges and discussing ways to overcome them to prepare Arab youth for future transformations.

The Young Arab Leaders Network currently includes more than 700 young men and women from various parts of the region, and aims to launch effective dialogues on ways to empower Arab youth in various fields, employ their enormous capabilities and energies in developing their societies, and prepare empowered young leaders capable of making qualitative shifts in all future sectors.

In the opening speech of the forum, His Excellency Khalfan Juma Belhoul, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Young Arab Leaders, confirmed that the launch of the Young Arab Leaders Network more than 20 years ago embodied the belief of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, may God protect him, in the importance of empowering and activating the role of young leaders in the process of development and shaping the future, and that Arab youth are not satisfied with dreaming of the future, but rather have the courage to create it, and the ability to endure. His responsibilities.

He said: The future of the Arab world will be shaped by investing in people, and by creating leaders who possess vision and skill, and understand the reality that is witnessing transformations in the economy, and raises fundamental questions about people and the meaning of life, work, and belonging.

He added: Our world is changing rapidly, but there is one truth that does not change, which is that the greatest investment is investment in people, and we want Arab youth to keep pace with rapid technological progress without losing their humanity, to build the economy without losing its values, and to create the future without escaping reality. We at the Young Arab Leaders Initiative will continue to work on a new, more influential and clearer stage in measuring the actual impact in our Arab societies.

Ahmed Galal, CEO of Majid Al Futtaim Holding in Egypt, spoke during a dialogue session entitled “Leading Major Organizations in the Age of Artificial Intelligence,” about the importance of empowering Arab youth with the latest future tools and skills to keep pace with technological transformations and enhance leadership skills that will be required in the future.

His Excellency Abdul Wahab Al-Rasheed, Minister of Finance and former Minister of State for Economic Affairs and Investment in the State of Kuwait, along with Rabie Ataya, President of Bayt.com, and Walid Mansour, co-founder and CEO of MEVP from Lebanon, participated in a dialogue session that focused mainly on aligning sovereign capital and developing talent.

His Highness Sayyid Azzan bin Qais Al Said, founder and CEO of the National Satellite Services Company “Nascom” and the “Ezlaq” space port in the Sultanate of Oman, and Hazza Al Mansouri, the Emirati astronaut, also participated in a dialogue session entitled “Characterizing Arab Ambition,” moderated by His Excellency Mohammed Abdullah Al Kaabi, Executive Director of the Ajman Government Media Office.

Another dialogue session entitled “Designing the Digital and Physical Fabric of the Arab World” hosted Nadine Mezher, Faisal Toukan, and Talal Toukan, followed by a session hosting engineer Sarah Al-Batouti, founder and CEO of ECOnsult, from Egypt, in which she spoke about various aspects of employing available resources and building frameworks for the new social contract.

The Young Arab Leaders Forum concluded with a session that hosted Fadi Ghandour, President of Wamda, in which he touched on many important aspects concerned with preparing young people for the future, in which he stressed that Arab youth have promising capabilities and big dreams that must be focused on ways to turn them into reality despite the challenges.

During the coming period, the “Young Arab Leaders” initiative aims to develop and implement many future projects and inspiring ideas in cooperation with Arab youth, and to benefit from the capabilities and experiences of members of the initiative to motivate and empower tomorrow’s young leaders.

The Young Arab Leaders Forum seeks to support the launch of many qualitative initiatives and projects during the coming period by benefiting from the participating Arab experiences, and will contribute to activating the role of young Arab leaders in broader fields.

It is worth noting that the Board of Directors of “Young Arab Leaders” includes His Excellency Khalfan Juma Belhoul from the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Abdullah Al Khalifa from the Kingdom of Bahrain, Tamam Manko from the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, Fahad Al-Ghanim from the State of Kuwait, Aissata Lam from Mauritania, Nasser Al-Khater from Qatar, Ibrahim Al-Muhtaseb from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Mona Ataya from Palestine, Basil Al-Baz from Egypt, and Yazan Al-Tamimi. from Iraq, Sami Daoud from the Sultanate of Oman, and Fatima Rashid Bujasim, Secretary-General of Young Arab Leaders.

For more information about the “Young Arab Leaders” initiative, please visit the website: (www.yaleaders.org).

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