Dr Roopnaraine’s challenge –and the National Youth Policy

SCORES of youths and other concerned Guyanese attended the recently concluded two-day working session aimed at finalising the long awaited National Youth Policy.

The event was organised by Presidential Adviser on Youth Empowerment, Aubrey Norton, who reiterated the government’s commitment to forging a new relationship with the country’s young people.
From all reports, the exchanges among the young people and the recommendations were of a high quality.
Norton should be congratulated for moving with some degree of haste on this project. In the final analysis, Guyana’s overall developmental policy would be incomplete if due regard is not paid to the role of the youth. But the youth would have to redefine their collective role and perspective.
This was recognised by Education Minister Dr Rupert Roopnaraine who charged the youths in attendance to make national reconciliation the centrepiece of their thrust.
This call by Dr Roopnaraine is most timely. While the fractured nature of the Guyanese polity is widely acknowledged, the extent to which it has stifled the country’ socio-economic development is not always appreciated by the young people.
Despite their progressive rhetoric on race relations, their political culture has not differed much from the rest of the country. The result of the recent elections is a vivid testimony to this. By charging them with the task of leading the movement for reconciliation, Dr Roopnaraine is challenging the youth to assume the primary responsibility for the future of Guyana.
Dr Roopnaraine also makes the linkage between youth empowerment and national reconciliation. In other words, the notion of youth empowerment would be meaningless if it is not situated in the larger national context. A National Youth Policy outside of national healing would eventually flounder.
This points the youth in a different direction, away from the traditional attitude that has tended to situate youth issues as almost autonomous from the rest of the society. It also challenges them to confront the hard political and economic issues of the day; something that youth organisations other than the ones affiliated with the political parties have tended to shy away from.
If the Roopnaraine prescription is to be followed, then a national youth policy would be located within the larger national thrust.
Towards this end, we urge the youth to take up Dr Roopnaraine’s challenge and reach for a more enlightened perspective on their collective role in the society.
They must move beyond simplistic notions of nationhood and politics. They must also turn their faces away from the rabid individualism that threatens the idea of the nation. The youth must assume leadership in the widest sense and at all levels of the society. Only then would a National Youth Policy be truly national.

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