BARTICA’S youngest constituency councillor, Estiva Lake, has responsibility over the largest constituency in the town and has great plans for the development of the youths.

The 25 year old who serves as a teacher at St. Anthony’s Primary School in Bartica, told this newspaper that growing up in her area she realised that everyone has needs, and persons were paying little attention to the needs of the young people.

This caused her to develop a passion for youth empowerment and community development.

“Not a lot of focus is paid to the development of young people in my constituency, and growing up I was fortunate to have persons supporting me and guiding me in the right direction, but there are so many others who were/are not as fortunate to have that support system and guide,” Lake said.

That in essence, was her reason for taking up the opportunity to run for representative of constituency three. “I found pleasure in being an advocate for the young generation, and I will use this opportunity to support those young ones who are not privileged with the support system they so deserve. Because of my profession, I love to influence others to be the best, to make Guyana the best. I was never a person to waste an opportunity and I intend to use every opportunity possible to make constituency three a model one,” she said.

The young leader shared that she plans to approach the Guyana Board of Industrial Training to have more youths enrolled in their technical courses offered in Bartica. The technical courses, she said,- will equip them with the skill set to made valuable contributions to the betterment of their community.

Additionally, she has intentions of creating a safe home for children that are being abused or are emotionally lopsided and just need someone to talk to.

Also on her agenda, Lake said she will be working towards creating a programme to raise funds for young people to write the Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) examinations.

“I find that a lot of school dropouts occur in Bartica. A lot of our young people have no qualifications and it is mostly because they could not have afforded to write any subject at CXC. Creating the fund will be for the young people who cannot afford to write subjects, I want to give them the opportunity to have a chance at life, and to not have a torn future because they ‘weren’t fortunate’,” the young woman said.

She further pointed out that even though her main focus is on the youths, it is not her sole focus. She also has plans to create ways in which she can be of assistance to the elderly as well.

And apart from developing the human resources of her constituency, she said that she will also be lobbying with the Town Council and the Regional Democratic Council to target issues such as road development, drainage maintenance and animal control.

The councillors were sworn in last week but will become operational after the Mayor and Deputy Mayor are sworn in by His Excellency, President David Granger.