The Gorilla Highlands region — one of stunning beauty and abundance — remains in a shaky security and economic situation due to the paradox of personal poverty amidst richness of natural resources, persistent militarisation, mistrust and endemic corruption. Young people of Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo lack business opportunities and models for effective activism to advance their communities. The right mix of entrepreneurship, conservation, creative activities, sports, practical support, peacebuilding, and movement mobilisation will forge relationships, nourish grassroots solidarity and enhance problem solving.
The future of this region will remain questionable unless people become more confident leaders and advocates in and for their communities. Person-to-person exchange and organising done at scale can make a significant contribution to regional peacebuilding and civic engagement. Given the young average age, we see a chance to envision and co-create home-grown solutions to the various challenges facing the region.
Illumineers Mission Statement
We connect the youth of Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo and give them practical skills that lead to personal development, civic engagement and regional peacebuilding.
Theory of Change
If we make a conducive and stimulating environment for young people, they will feel more empowered and confident to lead positive changes in their communities. This, coupled with transboundary networking and economic development, will boost peace and security in the region.
Progress So Far
In 2023-2025 we enrolled two “Illumineers” cohorts in Rwanda’s Musanze district, offering young people (15-30 years of age) connections, support, solutions to their problems and active exposure to societal issues. The program attracted the youth by having an emphasis on entrepreneurship skills and international connections but included much more:
- partnerships with enterprises, organisations and individuals ready to share their space and skills at weekend business accelerator workshops
- international friendship camps (for the 2025 edition click here)
- seed funding capital (available to members for conservation/environmental businesses)
- sports and personal growth sharing gatherings
- leadership and digital literacy training sessions
- social responsibility program focused on Historically Marginalised People
Plans for 2026
Building on the experience obtained in Rwanda, we plan to expand the concept into southwestern Uganda in 2026. We also envisage an online course and community to cater for ongoing learning.
Please click on this link to donate to Illumineers.
Our Illumineers Stories:
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It Hits Different: Illumineers Video, Friendship Camp Edition
The freshest, the most 🔥 version of the Illumineers promo video is here — with tons of footage from Friendship Camp! Feeling generous today? GoFundMe link is right here. 😎 You may also like: To Fly or Not to Fly? Let’s Talk Responsible Tourism!A Decade of Successes (and Personal Milestones) in Akagera National Park, RwandaLean…
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Illumineers to Transform the Gorilla Highlands Region
One of the gifts Gorilla Highlands Experts (GHE) — specialists from a variety of fields — bring to our region is the annual Friendship Camp. The 2025 edition, which wrapped up on Sunday, proved once again that young minds have the power to together transform DR Congo, Rwanda and Uganda. These youngsters have been dubbed…
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Ambrose’s Lake Bunyonyi Quickie — For Lifetime Impact!
The absolute star of the first full GHE Friendship Camp day at Edirisa on Lake Bunyonyi was Ambrose Kibuuka. He’s our co-founder, education and careers consultant, best-selling author of “After University, What Next?”, and possibly the busiest man alive. Yesterday morning he rolled in on a night bus from Kampala (took him 12 hours!), squeezed…
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25 Friendship Campers, 4 Days at Lake Bunyonyi
Just one week to go! ⏱️ The 25 awesome delegates may already be packing their bags for Uganda’s Lake Bunyonyi — the next stop of the GHE Friendship Camp journey! Coming in from DR Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda, the crew is all about crossing borders, sparking friendships, and celebrating our region’s colourful cultures: 🇷🇼 Adeline…
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Why “Illumineers”: Building a Young Future for DR Congo, Rwanda and Uganda
Right from the moment we started dreaming about taking an active role in shaping the future of the Gorilla Highlands region shared by Rwanda, Uganda and DR Congo, our foremost focus has always been on the youth. We see young leaders as the driving force behind the change we envision, while we stay open to unexpected inspirations…
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Friendship Camp 2025: Bonding at Lake Bunyonyi, Uganda
Illumineers from the Gorilla Highlands region and friends from near and far — we’re coming together again! You’re probably wondering: “Who’s ‘we’?” We are breakthrough young activists from DR Congo, Uganda, and Rwanda. Gorilla Highlands Experts want to see these amazing changemakers unite on a beautiful Lake Bunyonyi peninsula, right at the edge of the…
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Better Find 18 Minutes for This (If You Are a True Team Player)
Dozens of Gorilla Highlands diehards joined hands for the latest scoop on 11 January 2025, but there are hundreds of you who still need to be updated! The below edit of the Zoom call comes with a Freeform board that you can get access to by sending us your Apple account email — or you…
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Mobility Issues? David Can’t Be Stopped!
Three years after he explored Uganda with us, David Azumbrado came back for more. This time he spiced up his travel days (and the lives of GHE Youth Spaces participants) with a presentation about using digital technologies. Once the volunteering day was ticked off, he hit the roads of Rwanda for real. He paid a…
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Judges From Dubai Decide … Beetroot for the Win!
Brigitte Ishimwe and Justine Mukandayisenga have emerged as the champions of the 2024 cohort of GHE Youth Spaces! Their Beet-Nourish Creation business most impressed our judges from Omnicom Media Group (MENA) — in the photo they are posing with the company CEO, Elda Choucair. You might notice that Elda’s attire is a bit unusual for…
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And the Top Three Teams Are … (Youth Spaces Pitch Pictorial)
Before we proceed: congratulations to Rwanda on its Liberation Day! 30 years ago, the Rwandan Patriotic Front ended the genocide against the Tutsi, and thanks to this revolution we can now proudly take you to the town of Musanze in the north of the country, right under the Virunga volcanoes … … where the last…
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2024 Youth Spaces Cohort: Crazy Cashless People
The ball is now in play! The 2024 GHE Youth Spaces cohort kicked off last weekend, with a session held at INES in Musanze. 27 participants met in a classroom on its beautiful campus with a golden statue of St John Paul II in the centre and with sweet sounds of birds chirping from the trees,…
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Who Is in the Second Crop of Youth Spaces?
This year, our call to participate in GHE Youth Spaces received many fantastic responses! Ambitious youngsters seem to be excited about the program. It wasn’t easy selecting from 56 group applications from approximately 120 individuals! We are inviting the following 30 young leaders with inspired ideas to gain knowledge and resources and contribute to our environment: Weekend get-togethers will start later this…
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Do You Have a Cool Business or Project Idea That Is Environmentally Friendly?
The GHE Youth Spaces program is back! Supported by Omnicom Media Group (OMG), the second cohort will again take place in Musanze — between April and July 2024.The program’s mission is to give the youth practical skills that lead to personal development, civic engagement and regional peacebuilding in the transboundary region shared by Rwanda, Uganda…
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OMG! Youth Spaces Get Multi-Talented Friends From Dubai!
GHE Youth Spaces will have an Arabian taste this year — or should we say a global one? This week we had a call with Alanna Turpin who leads sustainability and culture efforts at the Omnicom Media Group (OMG). Their Dubai office is eager to support Youth Spaces in 2024, with a substantial donation and…
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How Roma Waited and Waited, and Is Funding a Camp Now!
Our friends, it’s been months since we shared the news about the end of our NGO registration struggles, and now we have another milestone to share: there is a Gorilla Highlands Experts (GHE) bank account in existence! Thrilling, right? We know you have been wondering how to fund our much-needed activities with Rwandan youth ……
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Alex’s Full African Menu (He Loved Every Serving!)
Our October was distinguished by a visit from Washington — no, it wasn’t Biden just yet, but Alex Wilson ticked many boxes too. From the moment he read about us in the Washington Post, Alex was a fan who wanted to become part of our tribe. With his background in high school teaching, he was…
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Border to Border — From Our High Season Months
On Uganda’s border with South Sudan, Kidepo Valley NP is a phenomenal destination that is not a common part of our itineraries. (It’s kinda far …) But when Ramon from Slovenia requested Kidepo, we were happy to oblige, and also added Semliki on Uganda’s boundary with DR Congo. (He had over 3 weeks at his…
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Youth Spaces Pitch Day Is Approaching — Be With Us!
Do you know that 40% of the Rwandan population are aged 14-35 while Uganda has 78% of youth under 30 years of age, according to UNDP? To these stats, we can add one from Unicef: 0-24-year-old population represents 67% of the Congolese. Powerful, right? Imagine what environmental impact these young people can make … Trust…
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SABA Episode #24 — Amazing Kids Reflect on Youth Spaces
For the end of the third season of SEE AFRICA BREATHE AFRICA, something completely different: an episode devoted to our own GHE Youth Spaces. We listen to the youthful participants themselves — and it makes us smile. It shall cheer you up as well, guaranteed! And when you eventually feel like supporting the program yourselves, you…
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26 Musanze Youngsters, 10 Ideas, 3 Months, 1 Planet Earth
Earth Day 2023 was a perfect occasion for the first session of the GHE Youth Spaces pilot program with 26 selected participants behind 10 business/project ideas:Banana Soft Drink: Janvier Manirahari, Jean Francois Ishimwe, Shallon KayitesiCharcoal Briquettes: Ignace Mugabo, James MuhirwaEco-Friendly Piggery: Florence Uwamahoro, Etienne TuyizereGreen Library: Enock Niyokuri, Paulin Polepole, Clement IraguhaHoney Production: Barthelemy Ryumugabe,…
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In Photos: Pioneering Volunteer Adventure in Rwanda & Uganda
Today’s story will be the last for some weeks. Our home country Rwanda begins the annual commemoration of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi tomorrow. With GHE Youth Spaces — the core of the adventure presented in 10 images — we try to play our part in building a nation and a transboundary region where…
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28 Youth Spaces Applications Came In
We owe you a little update: by the deadline — 27 March — we had 28 business/project ideas submitted for the Youth Spaces pilot program. Each of them was sent in by a team of 2-3 youngsters and since we can’t accept more than 30 people, a rigorous selection process follows … On 17 April…
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Apply for GHE Youth Spaces Here!
Please click on this link to go the GHE Youth Spaces application form. [PAST DEADLINE] Pilot Program OutlineYouth Spaces is a core program of the Gorilla Highlands Experts (GHE) organisation that will be piloted in 2023. The program’s mission is to give the youth practical skills that lead to personal development, civic engagement and regional…
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We Will Be Building Trust
Daniel “Emeka” Nwachukwu’s educational background is fascinating: he left urban Nigeria to add a Bachelor’s business degree in rural Rwanda to the computing diploma he had obtained at home. His observations of Rwandan students — the main target group of our Youth Spaces — proved invaluable when Misigaro (in blue) sat down to draft the…
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Youth Spaces: Is There Finally Something on the Horizon?
March is around the corner, and five Norwegian students will soon volunteer for Youth Spaces — they are even coming with funding for the program! Yet we do not know if the Gorilla Highlands Experts Organisation (our non-profit wing) will officially exist by then …We had a general assembly in June 2022 and started the…
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T-Shirts With a Message About Us
The new Gorilla Highlands guide t-shirts came from Kampala to Kabale on a night bus yesterday, and immediately got onto the bodies of our Lake Bunyonyi team. It was the first day of Mama Bena’s Bonus, one of our top canoeing and hiking activities in Uganda.#GHTrails on the shirts refers to that aspect of our…
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Our Christmas Camp was just the START, 2023 we are COMING!
A New Year is almost here, and hopefully you have been having a great time with family and friends this Holiday season. For us at Gorilla Highlands Experts, Christmas began with our camp on 21 December at Cyuza Island on Rwanda’s Lake Burera … We socialised, enjoyed fresh salads and hot coffee, drove and paddled…
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GHE Christmas Camp: Free of Charge & Full of Action!
Hello, ladies/gents, girls/boys!!! After an epic registration process Gorilla Highlands Experts (GHE) is back in the biggest possible way, inviting you to:What? GHE Christmas CampWhere? Cyuza Island, Lake Burera, RwandaWhen? 21-23 December 2022For Whom? 15-30 Year-OldsCost? zero, zilch or nothingOh yes, all you will have to do is get yourself to Musanze Town on 21/12…
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Honestly, It’s Been an Insane Six Months!
Have you noticed us going quiet? Have you explained that away with a simple, “the pandemic is over and they must be very busy”? You were right. Or did you maybe think, “Probably there isn’t much new to report”? Well, you were correct again! The last few months have seen Gorilla Highlands Ltd (our travel…
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Which GHE Project Will You Pick?
Gorilla Highlands Experts now exists for real! 10.5 years after the Gorilla Highlands idea was born in southwestern Uganda — as a humble project by Edirisa — we finally have two proper entities:• Gorilla Highlands Limited as a tour company (this one has been in existence for a couple of years and is the current only…