MTN Afghanistan on 20^th June 2019, conducted MTN Y’ello Care Day through its annual 21
Day of Y’ello Care campaign in its head office in Kabul. The main aim of this day was to reduce unemployment and poverty to overcome drug addiction and illegal human trafficking in Afghanistan that lead to fatal consequences.

The aforementioned event was attended by Prof. Shafi Sharifi director of ICT Institute, Mr. Laiq Shah Zadran director of culture and youth volunteer program of Deputy Ministry of Youth Affairs, delegations from other Government and Non-Government entities and youths from different ethnic groups, Universities, institutions and civil societies. At the first stage of the program, Mr. Abbad Reda presented key speech to the participants of the event and said, “MTN Afghanistan as a telecom company, is always committed to take all possible steps necessary for the development of Afghan youth. We will create more opportunities for the development of Afghan youth to enable them to be self-sufficient”. He added that more than 10,000 job opportunities were created throughout our direct employment with our partners including suppliers, distributors and service providers. We are committed to introduce Mobile Money in the near future which is considered to have a positive direct and indirect effect on the economy by promoting cashless an ecosystem where customers can use the service to send and get money in easy and safe manner, pay their bills, cash in & amp; Cash out, and many other innovative services. All the details will be communicated once the service is launched. It is estimated that the MTN mobile money service will create more than 5,000 job opportunities in the first period.

Later on, Mr. Laiq Shah Zadran director of culture and youth volunteer program of Deputy
Ministry of Youth Affairs delivered his speech and said, first of all, I am thankful to MTN
Afghanistan Foundation for taking such initiatives that duly focused on youth career growth
that constitute the fundamental role in the youth self-sufficiency. He also added
that since youth make up more than 60% population of the country, by focusing on youth development, we are covering the majority portion of the community.

Mr. Hedayatullah Zahid, general manager of corporate affairs of MTN Afghanistan presented his speech and stated, “MTN Afghanistan, since commencing its telecom operations in
Afghanistan, has been supporting Afghan youth in different areas such as providing free education through long term and short term scholarships in different fields and
areas of expertise, creating well-equipped capacity building center in the premises of Deputy Ministry of Youth Affairs for the development of Afghan youth, establishment of a well-furnished ICT center in the directorate of youth affairs of Herat province in order to enable Herat youth to study and research in the different areas for free and many more.

He also added, “we have conducted several training programs for Afghan youth in Kabul and Nangarhar provinces focusing on youth development and provided them with streamline hardware and software and other necessary materials. On top of the above-mentioned initiatives which is taken by MTN Afghanistan Foundation, recently we established a unique IT Research Center for ICTI students under the name of “MTN IT Research Center” in Kabul that will be officially inaugurated in the presence of media and concerned parties. Through this center, the Afghan youth will be able to convert all the theoretical knowledge and ideas they got in the class and studied in books, into practical skills. At the last, Prof. Shafi Sharifi director of ICT Institute stated, despite many initiatives that have been taken by MTN Afghanistan Foundation for the development and growth of Afghan youth, there are still more work required to be done for Afghan youth development, therefore I call upon all the companies operating in the private sector and other Government and Non-Government organizations to join and follow MTNA footprint and work hard for the Afghan youth empowerment which is vital for the economic development of our country.

In the last stage of the event, some of the youth on behalf of the visiting groups expressed
gratitude to MTN-Afghanistan for facilitating such events. They recognized the benefits of
events like this as this was a new experience for them. As per the planned schedule, the MTN Y’ello Care Day participants conducted group discussion and provided their feedback on the Day’s theme that will be officially shared with relevant government entities.
MTN Afghanistan Foundation has previously made available educational opportunities to
thousands of students by providing scholarships in the educational and capacity building
institutions, and has set up educational programs to raise the capacity of the youths with training seminars, libraries, and mobile language classes. MTN has also helped the less fortunate by making a charitable donation of clothing and holding blood drives.