Youths have asked leaders of Least Developed Countries (LDCs) meeting in Doha, Qatar to harness and leverage the youths’ skills in their respective countries to achieve meaningful strides towards sustainable development.
During a Youth forum discussion on the sidelines of the Fifth United Nations Conference on LDCs on Sunday, Malawi youth representative Charles Kajoloweka urged the leaders to utilise the skills of the youth to achieve transformative change in their respective countries.
He said: “Young people are the heart of achieving the Malawi 2063, but to achieve that there is need for our country to invest in youth power so that they become a social capital for development. Malawi 2063 agenda is youth-centric and this is the right way to achieve development.
“No country can move forward without involving the youth and this needs to be addressed by flipping the script, from fear to hope, unemployment to employment, poverty to prosperity, conflict to peace and this will change the narrative to use their skills for a transformative change.”
Kajoloweka, who is executive director for Youth and Society, said Malawi also needs to invest more and diversify its economy by focusing on issues of mining in line with aspirations in Malawi 2063, the country’s long-term development strategy.
In an interview, Minister of Information Moses Kunkuyu said the Doha conference gives hope and a huge desire for LDCs to graduate to middle-income status with commitments made by developed countries.
He said: “Malawi is also committed to move towards graduation and exit from the LDC, now that we are exiting from being the chair of LDC, fighting corruption is key towards migrating from the LDCs.
“Malawi is such a country which has stuck on corruption and we cannot keep doing this for ages. It is like pouring resources into a basket that has holes. We must unite to fight against corruption and poverty.”
The Youth Forum, among other things, discussed stimulating efforts regarding empowerment issues amid the sufferings from insufficient resources, to combat epidemics and escalating debts, which has led to a decline in developmental progress of their respective countries.
The 46 LDCs have a total of about 242 million youths.
