Youth engagement meetings to continue

BY TAWANDA MUNYUKI
YOUTH, Sport and Child Development Minister, Emmanuel Mulenga has directed the Youth Development Council to continue organising engagement meetings between Government and youths every two months.
And Mr Mulenga said the meetings should also be taken to provincial levels.
Mr Mulenga said Government realises the important role that young people play in the governance of the nation hence the need to engage them regularly.
“We recognise the importance of constantly engaging with the youth on the various national issues hence the need for us to have more of such meetings”, he said.
Mr Mulenga also advised young people to understand the various empowerment programs that government has for the youths.
“We have a lot of empowerment programmes the youths can utilise and all of them are for the Zambian youths and is not attached to political affiliations,” he emphasised.
And Mr Mulenga said government is aware of the challenges affecting young people adding that everything possible is being done to ensure that a lasting solution is found.
Mr Mulenga cited unemployment and lack of access to financial loans as some of the main challenges affecting the youth.
“My ministry is aware of the challenges that our youths are grappling with and we are hopeful that with such platforms we will be able to come with solutions together and see the way forward,” he said.
Meanwhile Mr Mulenga also urged young people to utilize their talents to help sustain them financially and not always wait for white collar jobs.
He observed that a lot of young people are sitting on their talents and just waiting to be offered white collar jobs.
“ As youths learn to utilize your skills, your talents and not just wait for a white collar job but instead be the ones to create employment for other young people out there,” he said.
Speaking At the same meeting Youth Development Council secretary David Musonda said it was unfortunate that some young people who would rather continue speaking out on social media than engage leaders at meetings.
Mr Musonda said shunning such meetings and voicing out on various social media platform would not yield any positive results.
“We have seen a lot discussion on various social media platform by some youths speaking out and it is very unfortunate that they have decided to ignore a platform such as this one,” he said.