KENYA's Investment on Youth & Children
Posted June 16th, 2008 by malaika bella
While I welcome recent initiatives by Kenya to invest in youth through the Consituency Fund etc, I think that this is politically driven as opposed to genuine interest in including youth in the country's developemnt. Because youth form the majority of the voting block, politicians are scared of being voted out by youth so they are taking non-systematic approaches to please them.
However investment in youth should start from the moment a child is concieved. Is the Kenyan woman safe from rape, FGM, early marriage, domestic violence and HIV/AIDs? Is there proper money put to make sure that the child has access to food and proper education. If that child is not well fed, protected from violence, and educated, how will they become a functional youth in society?
The Kenyan Parliament should include young people in deliberating in what kindof investment in their welfare will truly promote their meaningful participation in the development of Kenya.
Sub Saharan Africa is a sub-region still undergoing development stages in consolidation of democracy, Human Rights and Good governance. Therefore in general the region is facing challenges to compliance fully with Human Rights instruments as enshrined in UN convention, and Declarations.
In the context of this rights there are special groups that are not always accommodated in terms of policies and participation in particular youth and women. Despite breakthroughs that have been made at African Union level by adoption of the African Youth Charter, very few countries have ratified the African Youth Charter and there is urgent need to advocate for the ratification and Domestification of African Youth Charter.
The ratification of the African Youth Charter forms a basis for proper articulation of youth rights and obligations of the state at national level and through regional facilities will develop a comprehensive regional Youth strategy to deal with youth issues as provided in the African Youth Charter.
It is the youth and women of the world who understand the problems affecting the society. The challenges facing the African society today are well articulated and summarized in the eight Millennium Development Goals. However, the State and its different apparatus must be taken into task to be transparent and accountable to the taxpayers. If there isn’t clear leadership dispensation in Africa and across the world, then the Eight MDGs shall become illusive just like many other government projects and policy articulations without any tangible effort to realize them. It is in this regard that the African Youth Charter seeks to mobilize African youth to act as vanguard and checks to these apparatus and of the governments and to actively involve themselves in policy formulation and implementation from the grass roots, to national level up to the regional level.
We seek to raise awareness of the problems affecting the society and in a nutshell summarized in the Eight MDGs and check and pressurize all institutions toward formulating and implementing policies geared toward realizing the MDGs. Besides checking the functioning and operations of policy makers, the charter confirms that to have a meaningful change inAfrica , there is a need for a generational change in the leadership realms. Focused and visionary young leaders must spearhead this change.
In this regard, the charter further seeks to mainstream the young men and women of Africa into active socio-economic and leadership affairs of this continent. This shall be realized through building the capacity of the youth to participate within electoral processes and other processes touching directly on the livelihoods of the youth.
Moreover, the youth should be involved in active processes of transforming the societies from participating in environmental conservation and protection, agricultural production, community development sports and talents development to mention a few. The question of the African Youth Charter addresses the need of the youth as leaders of today and not tommorrow. This is a focus that should be further highlighted least the national laws will subvert the Youth Charter, leaving the African Youth to wallow in a miasma of confusion and deceit, always surbordiante to structures that do not highlight their needs.
What vision is drivingKenya and by extension Africa ’s quest to combat poverty as espoused in the Millennium Development Goals and propagated by the United Nations? Perhaps each of the eight goals has its own vision. For instance, a vision to end extreme poverty and hunger, empower women, offer universal primary education and free health care and attain environmental sustainability. What is a vision?
A vision is the ability to think about or plan the future with imagination and wisdom. One’s imagination is fuelled by one’s understanding of “how the world works”, a discourse theorized greatly by Thomas Sowell, as he describes the parameters limiting one’s imagination. Critical to this is how our wisdom is driven by sense of causation. Therefore to develop a clear vision forAfrica our thinkers ought to subject their vision to the basic measure of understanding “causation” and generally “how the world work.”
In his book “A Conflict of Visions: Ideological Origins of Political Struggles,” Sowell points out two major types of vision: the constrained and unconstrained. The constrained vision is driven by the belief that human nature is inherently limited intellectually and morally and will always require interventions from society or external force to put it on ‘track’. On the other hand the unconstrained vision, views human nature as having potential far beyond what is presently manifested and only society and external forces can limit such potential.
What vision do our thinkers subscribe to? First our politicians have tended to take that crucial position of being thinkers and as such inKenya and Africa in general, the MDGs are strictly in the constrained vision category. That is, unless the United Nations and her partners intervene, extreme poverty, hunger, gender inequality, free healthcare and the environmental sustainability among other goals will not be attained. Our sense of causation has driven our policy makers to push for policies that will indeed see children in school, but fail to evaluate the content of education and the likely beneficiary in business terms to this goal. Therefore the achievement of MDGs remains at a superficial level and no effort has been made by its proponents to promote indigenous African businesses. True, people are hungry because they do not have food, but are we keen to evaluate reasons for their inability to produce and market to others?
Borrowing from Senator John Edward blueprint, “Restoring America’s Moral Leadership by Fighting Worldwide Poverty.” There is high reliance on the unconstrained vision approach to the challenges facing them. He taps and unleashes the unlimited potential of the human person to address the problems of poverty, hunger, inequality, environment, illiteracy and poor health. The overall national or continental goal ought to promote that which addresses the quest by the human person to self actualize either through business, innovations or service to others.
I propose thatKenya and by extension African countries go for one unconstrained vision: to promote business in addressing the needs of Africa . Our goal should be to promote business people in Africa and our dream should be to turn each African challenge into a business opportunity and in it we combat poverty the best way we know!
Kenya could be lauded for an initiative that could, if properly utilize, provide a means of economic emancipation of the Kenyan Youth. The Youth Enterprise Development Fund, my dear friends, provides such a possibility. The Constituency Fund as a devolved form of economic governance is still out of reach from youth. While the act is of good intension, its interpretation s full of flaws: a political gimmick and an easy cash access for members of parliament to further control resources at the constituency level.
Visionary as it maybe, poverty should be understood within many different contexts: afterall, young people are not homogenous. There are different contexts that include levels of education, education, live vision and at times natural wisdom and the ability of young entrepreneurs to adapt to a world that is increasingly globalizing, hence increasing competitiveness of goods and services from other regions of the world.
There has to be a “real” commitment to investing in young people and as well envisioned: investment in health, education and other basic aspect of life as the foundations for a healthy mind and confident African Youth. The availability of financing must go along with capacities that improve quality and innovation. Standards will ensure that such economic endowments to youth bear returns and therefore, provide possibilities for spreading the wealth: if investments had a real intention. The mere inclusion of young people in these processes, though noble, has to be genuine.
The mere selection of a cadre of young people even to populate the boards of these funds or committees is as cosmetic as the funds themselves. Why not democratize these processes? Let young people decide who sits on the boards of these institutions, if we are really a democratic society: democracy is a way of life, and shying away from these principles, especially within the realm of economics simply brings into focus the hidden agendas of these paradigms that we claim to uphold. In economics, in the proverbial Darwin theory under the profit-loss paradigm, someone has to gain and another must lose. Let us remember, the youth fund disbursements are loans!
The Youth Fund models should therefore be moved from the political terrain, away from political influence or as we say here, voting blocks preferences. It is amazing how the government is suddenly hush hush about the fund, while it was all carrot dangling about the fund and its increase during last years’ political campaigns. What are the learning generated from former disbursements of the fund? Has the fund really emancipated young people or at times created situations of dependency or even indebtedness.
Let be more critical as Kenyan as well as African Youth. The current emerging entrepreneurs and middle management of most companies are young people. Why not develop a paradigm of giving? one that is inherent in our cultures. As we search for a new Pan-Africanism, why not revisit our African values that ensured an environment that ensured dignity for all in the community. Why not develop our own fund, inspire a culture of voluntarism and ensures the sharing of professional skills in business and other fields.
As one wise one once said “we are all a total sum of our experiences”. Why not share experiences with those who have not been fortunate to walk the journeys’ that we have been fortunate to take: whether a better education or simply a better way of living. This means, investing in youth is a collective responsibility, each one of us, and should not be left to politicians: we all know where their hearts and minds lie.
Something to think about.
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