THE MISSION OF THE CURRENT GENERATION OF YOUTH SHOULD BE THE STRUGGLE AGAINST ITSELF
It is an old-aged practice that at every juncture in the march towards a better world order, political activists and pundits alike have from time to time assessed the subjective and objective political factors that shape the nature of the challenges represented by each epoch. The comprehensive evaluation of these challenges should always and necessarily lead to the question: What is to be done? The answer to this question should at least give a picture of what the mission of each generation should be.
Invariably, Frantz Fanon's famous words are constantly referred to: ‘each generation must, in relative obscurity, discover its mission and either fulfil it, or betray it'. This is a call to action and every generation should take it seriously. At least here in South Africa some within the youth movement have attempted to respond to this clarion call by one of the greatest practical thinkers we have seen in history. I also attempt here to share my thoughts regarding what should be the single most important mission of the youth in South Africa today.
Accordingly, it is my considered view that the single most important mission that should preoccupy the youth today is the struggle against itself. If the youth is to be able to deal effectively with any other serious challenge we have in this country, it should first struggle against its own subjective weaknesses and excesses that have characterised the current generation of youth at a political, social and economic levels.
The political manifestations of the subjective youth weaknesses and excesses
It is one's opinion that our political space - with a few notable exceptions - is saturated by young and useless political entrepreneurs whose main mission is to become super rich via political office. These young politicians are not the most brilliant in our midst. In fact they represent a dangerous mediocrity that will do everything, including murder, to protect its political-cum-economic interests.
These political entrepreneurs go around calling each other ‘leadership' as an enthusiastic expression of their main intent: which is to lead at all costs! In this connection, leadership positions have now become a new political scam in the hands of political crooks to feed their nefarious personal interests. The main concern in all this is that at the centre of it all are young people.
Following this logic, today's youth activism has rendered politics to cease to be a high calling to serve one's people. In our hands politics has been transformed into a social class above society, whose main objective is to feed its greedy and voracious appetite for all that is expensive and flashy. In this high political society political ambition trumps principle and morality, thus creating a band of political criminals.
Today in the ANCYL and ANC we have become accustomed to vicious young people who hate any serious political engagement or analysis. These young fellows are just content in discussing the next deployment to that monotonously so-called ‘strategic position'. Our level of political thinking and intellectual capacity ranks extremely low by the same standards compared to many African countries and other developing countries. There is no serious effort on our part critically to evaluate South Africa's needling challenges in order practically to come up with new and workable solutions.
All we do best is regurgitate the same old political dogma and sloganeering. We enthusiastically set out to learn by rote all these rudimentary political formulations, generalisations and conclusions without seriously putting any effort in coming up with innovative political solutions.
Consequently, the youth that now finds itself in parliament - welcome as this development may be - are just content with jostling for President Zuma's attention through invective directed at the opposition. Their intellectual and political depth is at times found wanting. Besides them rejuvenating the otherwise sleepy parliament, we had expected these young people to inject parliament with the necessary intellectual steam it so desperately needs.
This should be their main preoccupation, rather than competing with opposition in heckling. As locomotives of history, these young people should provide parliament with radical and innovative ideas to break through the concrete ceiling we seem to have hit at the economic front especially. Instead we seem to be obsessed with stupid red overalls and aprons at the expense of serious intellectual work in parliament and other organs of state power
Socio-Economic manifestations of the youth weaknesses and excesses
Regrettably, the well intentioned economic transformation programmes put in place by government have been turned into get-rich-quick schemes by the youth. We have a certain layer of youth elite that has ensured that their proximity to power bolsters their narrow economic interests at the expense of many other young people. This youth elite has learned and perfected a very ignominious culture of profiting from the poverty of the poor. They rake in millions through corrupt tenders for providing shoddy or no service at all to the poor communities.
According to this young political elite education is something to be shunned as a useless and a wasteful endeavour. Education is not something to aspire to or to reward according to them. What is primary is to get political power or political connection and then you can kiss poverty good bye by lending a lucrative job.
Hlaudi Motsoeneng is a case in point. No youth leader or activist worth her salt should ever defend Hlaudi. But not with us South African youth leaders and activists. We have defended him and even insulted those who have found conduct of impropriety on the part of this man. We defend a man who gets employed in a job that pays him over a Million Rand with no recognisable qualifications, except for boasting with his overflowing ego that seems to ooze out of his eyes.
In this connection, socio-political conscience and morality have become worthless concepts to joke about by our youth. In fact one gets told with a straight face that you will either eat principles and morals or toe the gravy line. Economic freedom is important only for as long as the politically connected youth are first in the line of tenders and other economic empowering programmes. The rest of the youth can just be praise-singers of this youth political elite and be content with wining and dining in lavish parties, or on occasions get crumbs (literally) in big rallies organised by this elite.
We have let the disempowering political system to reduce young people into sort of beggars who must await child support grants and food parcels every month. Not that there is anything wrong with grants and food parcels as they are a defence line between life and death for the poor. What is of great concern is the absence of intellectual innovation on the part of the youth to transform this social wage into sustainable development programmes. Without these sustainable development programmes, these grants and food parcels have had unintended consequences of killing the productive capacity of young people, with disastrous social ills ranging from murder, rape, robbery, alcoholism, drug dependency and so on.
All the above is raised just so we all know what it is that we have become as the youth of South Africa today. If we are to respond with any level of seriousness to Frantz Fanon's clarion call, we must wage a relentless struggle against ourselves to rid us of these regressive and barbaric propensities. This should be our single most important mission of the youth in South Africa today. Otherwise we will not be able to deal with any other serious challenge facing us as a country. It is that simple (or is it?): let's struggle against ourselves!
Mzukisi Makatse is a member of the ANC writing in his personal capacity
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