YOUTH WANT JOBS, QUALITY EDUCATION, HEALTH, MORE

MANZINI – Are jobs, quality education and healthcare too much to ask for?

This is the question asked by some members of the youth, who are now advocating for change in terms of the way the country is governed.  They asked themselves this question after listing the issues they have been complaining about to government for a long time. In a nutshell, the youth said they wanted quality education, decent jobs, adequate health service and access to land without the condition of being married. They also said they wanted accountability and transparency from those in power. The Swaziland National Union of Students (SNUS) President Colani Maseko said the social ills under the current system of governance were too many. He said they had been complaining about these for a while now and the alleged police brutality, which they were protesting against, amplified the frustration within them about the above mentioned issues and exposed what was happening with government under the current system of governance.

Investing

He said instead of investing in the youth by strengthening the education sector and employment, government was allegedly spending millions of Emalangeni buying weapons to fight the youth every time they raised issues.
Therefore, he said so long as the country continued to disregard young people, particularly students, it would not go anywhere and that was their worry. He added that the statement which was made by Sigwe Member Parliament (MP) David ‘Cruiser’ Ngcamphalala, who is also the Minister of Tinkhundla Administration and Development, where he said MPs were not elected by ‘people from social media and they should be ignored’, illustrated the gravity of how much government allegedly undermined young people.

In that regard, he said as the youth, they believed such politicians were allegedly seeking political promotions at their expense as young people. He said they believed that parliamentarians, who represented the masses, should be embarrassed that the same government they worked for did not prioritise the youth. Thereafter, the president of the union of students said the reason they were advocating for change as SNUS was because they believed that in a democratic government, the youth should be prioritised as they were the future of the country. “Our issues will be addressed. We will be given opportunities to lead in some political and administrative posts, unlike in the current system,” Maseko said.

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