Government has announced plans to introduce two initiatives aimed at empowering and developing the youth in the country.
One of the initiatives called ‘Special Child and Youth Rehabilitation Fund’ will specifically enable youths from poor families have access to vocational and technical training while the other, ‘National Youth Development Service’, will make the youth acquire skills for self-reliance.
Speaking at the opening of the 45th Session of Parliament in Lilongwe on Tuesday, President Peter Mutharika said his government decided to introduce the programmes after noting the significant contribution empowered youths make to any county’s socio-economic development.
Said Mutharika: “We are going to introduce innovative community colleges that will make use of existing structures in all districts to provide practical knowledge and skills relevant to our economy and for self-employment.
“We will also design basic education in a manner that it produces youths who are able to engage in trade, business and production [because] we recognise the role that education plays in fostering innovation and creativity.”
He added that youths will be empowered to articulate their own needs through the formation of area, district and national youth organisations.
“Government will strive to efficiently harness the potential of the youth and equip them with knowledge and skills necessary for their full participation in the social, cultural, economic and political development of the country. Therefore, in addition to that, we will establish new vocational and business training centres for vendors and create new opportunities for loans to enable the youth to start their own businesses,” he said.
Reacting to the plans, education and youth activist Lucky Mbewe said while he agreed with Mutharika’s view that these initiatives will encourage the youth to develop a mentality towards non-white collar jobs, the two programmes are just replicating initiatives already in existence.
“It would make sense if government merged all the programmes targeting youth development into one comprehensive project for easy monitoring and impact assessment. Otherwise, it will be the same old story where such initiatives only benefit those that are well connected politically,” said Mbewe.
Mutharika also announced that in the next five years his government will add 10 000 new students to the country’s three public universities and various Technical, Entrepreneurial, Vocational, Education and Training (Tevet) programmes.n
