Behind every spiralling statistic of youth employment released, there is a human face: a dispossessed young person on the margins who feels deliberately sidelined from opportunities and lashes back in unsavoury manners.
Even so, when called to attend to youth issues, society – or those meant to be responsible – dismisses young people as “hot-headed, spoilt-brats, overenthusiastic, rash, and impudent”. But calling them names only serves to intensify their welling rage.
We can only underestimate youth unrest at our own peril, as experience has revealed.
The country’s recent history has proved that youth unrest could sow the seeds of various forms of social and political revolution – the 1976 Soweto Uprising, a case in point. Further afield, in North Africa, disenfranchised youth ignited of the revolution dubbed ‘The Arab Spring’ that is reconfiguring the political landscape of the region.
No doubt, if leaders relish calling the youth ‘future leaders’ addressing the plight the face should be their top priority. So, the following means could uplift the country’s youth:
- Make an effort to train one young person with a skill the country needs urgently (critical skills). Don’t underestimate the difference it can make to the country in the long run.
- Listen to a problem a young person faces and get to the bottom of it
- Give young people a platform to prove themselves and flourish. Don’t put the accent on experience when you have a job vacancy. You gained experience, and were not born with it. So why them?
- The IT savvy youth have ways of doing things that are different from your ‘ancient’ times, like relying on technology to perform certain tasks. Let them use technology to achieve deliver.
- Create platforms that could develop balanced young people – socially, physically and emotionally.