YOUTH DAY FEATURE
SA’s leaders need to know what type of young people they want to produce. Without an idea, they have no future
LEANING forward and placing both arms on the boardroom table as if to ram her point home, Sibongile Mkhabela shared what she said pained her about South Africa’s youth.
“Unfortunately, unlike fellow African countries, this country has no clear vision for the type of young people it wants to produce.”
Mkhabela was one of the elite pupils who were chosen by their peers to lead the historic June 16, 1976 march in Soweto, where thousands took to the streets to protest against the repressive apartheid regime. She was in matric.
The meeting which birthed the march, Mkhabela said, took place at the iconic Donaldson Orlando Community Centre on June 13 – a Sunday afternoon. It was chaired by Tsietsi Mashinini, who formed the Soweto Student Representative Council – the body which would organise and lead the march and choose her as an executive member.
Speaking to The Star this week to reflect on the status of young people 42 years after that momentous protest, Mkhabela said South African leaders preferred to “throw money at the problem”.
She said this was done via initiatives such as the National Youth Development Agency and a ministry dedicated to young people – instead of crafting an idea of what is wanted from the youth.
“I am a Christian and I subscribe to a Scripture in the Bible which says: ‘Where there is no vision, people perish.’ Now, it’s not: where there is no money, people perish. People perish where there is no vision,” she said.
Her views were echoed by legendary photographer Bongani Mnguni, who documented the fiery events of that era while working for the black-focused iconic newspaper The World.
Mnguni said he was pained at what he said was youth being preoccupied with alcohol “and having a nice time”, rather than being focused on developing the country.
“I think today’s young people need to stand together in unison and be focused, like their predecessors.
“They were determined to realise their goals of freeing the black nation. I could see how prepared they were to die, which is what happened when many of them were brutally killed. I think today’s youth needs the same drive,” Mnguni stressed.
In June 1991, at a conference in Abuja, Nigeria, the Organisation of African Unity declared June 16 as the Day of the African Child; an annual event.
African heads of state and government said at the time that the day sought to celebrate Soweto children’s bravery and to inspire future generations.
“The day thus celebrates the children of Africa and calls for a serious introspection and commitment towards addressing the numerous challenges facing children across the continent,” it said.
However, Mkhabela feels this declaration has been embraced more by our fellow Africans, who don’t boast the same resources as South Africa.
“How many times have you heard South Africans complaining about foreign nationals who take ‘their’ jobs? “Every time I go and do my hair – every time – I find a foreign national who struggled to learn English and entered this country with nothing. They tell me their stories.
“They found their way either to the townships or other marginal communities where there is a level of entry. I I think of a young South African entering the Democratic Republic of the Congo, learning French and hiring locals, I can’t imagine that,” Mkhabela asserted.
“But I’m fascinated by these young people who are French-speaking, come to our country and, before we know, they start speaking indigenous languages.
“Then they open up businesses where they hire South Africans. There is something wrong in the way we perceive the world and ourselves in relation to the world.”
She added that the “old people” were to blame for what she felt was this anomaly, including the staggeringly high youth unemployment rate, which is more than 50%.
In March, President Cyril Ramaphosa launched the Youth Employment Service in tandem with the private sector, an initiative which seeks to create a million job opportunities for young people over the next three years.
Speaking at the launch, Ramaphosa acknowledged the youth unemployment crisis, saying: “We see this initiative as one pillar of a broad and comprehensive national effort to create opportunities for young people.”
Mkhabela, who is the chief executive of the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, as well as the Nelson Mandela Children’s Hospital Trust, credits leaders in Soweto for helping to develop what she called “the African child”.
She said the government should place more emphasis on developing community leaders, instead of taking everything on itself.
Mkhabela gave examples of 1970s university students who, upon being expelled for activism, would return and teach in township school to conscientise learners.
In the book The Road to Soweto: Resistance and the Uprising of 16 June 1976, author Julian Brown lists one of these as Onkgopotse Tiro, who was a history teacher at Morris Isaacson High School.
However, he was expelled after six months after education authorities put pressure on principals to dismiss those expelled from universities.
“We need more selfless leaders at a community level if we are to create a viable vision for our young people,” Mkhabela contended.
Leaders preferred to throw money at the problem