Unemployed youth should fight for better life

Radical economic transformation would be undermined by the rot, writes Morgan Phaahla.

Since 1994, the country commemorates the selfless youth activists who waged a historic defiance against the apartheid regime. It’s sad that economic reform has not done enough to change the lives of young people, particularly the poor.

Corruption is still at the centre of the problem, both in government and the private sector, to the detriment of growth.

The struggle facing the present-day youth is the unbridled corruption derailing transformation in society.

The largest constituency remains the historically disadvantaged people and, particularly, the unemployed youth.

Yet government spends billions to bailout nonperforming entities bedevilled by mismanagement and fraught with corruption.

In the private sector, certain companies are involved in collusion while others contrive complicated fronting practices to subdue the black majority shareholders in a malicious and deliberate manner.

These corporate citizens show off their huge socioeconomic development contributions that have no relation to the reality of young people.

Interventions hardly reach the economically distressed areas. This prompts youth migration to the cities because of the belief that there’s no meaningful transformation, citing the BBBEE programme to be benefiting the elites and white monopoly capital as insensitive to the poor.

That’s why some resort to anarchy when they should fight for a better life like the youth of 1976.

The radical economic transformation agenda would be undermined by the rot hindering service delivery.