Statement by the African National Congress Youth League: The 4th National General Council has ushered in a new era

14 October 2015 

AS THE leadership of the ANCYL, we want to proclaim unequivocally that the 4th National General Council of the ANC has ushered a new era and created hopes for millions of young people.  We are calling upon the Progressive Youth Alliance partners and the young people throughout the length and breadth of our country to ride the wave of the much successful 4th NGC. 

We commend young lions for remaining disciplined and for dedicating their energies towards shaping the ANC policies to be biased towards the youth as they form the majority of the country’s population. 

ANCYL delegates upon arriving at Gallagher Estate understood that they represented the will of millions of young people and were cognisant of the fact that our democracy can only be secured if there is an active participation of young people in the transformation of society. 

It is on this note that we assure the leadership of the ANC, the alliance partners and the people of this country as a whole that we will use our vibrancy to take this country forward and equally using our own resolutions adopted during the ANCYL 25th National Congress held in August and the resolutions of the 4th NGC as a guiding compass.

Education, Health, Science and Technology

We are fully aware that this country cannot leapfrog stages of socio-economic development without a skilled population. In this regard, we will mobilize young people using our structures, to be preoccupied with the business of the acquisition of skills and knowledge required to take this country forward.

Working with the Youth Progressive Alliance Components, civil society, the ANC led government and the private sector - we will launch a “Skills Development Campaign” that is aimed at mobilizing the people of this country to take an active interest in education starting from early childhood development, through to tertiary institutions. This campaign is inspired by the ANC NGC to begin the implementation of free education in South Africa with the intention of skilling our people and thus preparing them to take over the economy of South Africa. This ANC has thus committed to taking practical steps towards the implementation of free education particularly post matric schooling by 2019.  

We will continue as the ANCYL to mobilize alongside our sister organization SASCO for the transformation of institutions of higher learning. We want the curriculum in our institutions, to respond positively to the socio-economic challenges faced by young people and the country as a whole. The need for such transformation is made evident by the production of unemployable graduates that mostly lack entrepreneurship skills and are incapable of being swallowed into our economy.

The mismatch between the skills demanded by employers and those available in the pool of unemployed young graduates is the biggest contributor to higher figures of unemployment. We will be mobilizing the private sector through the Black Management Forum, Business Unity of South Africa, the South African Chamber of Commerce and professional bodies to address this problem.

Ahead of the NGC, the President of the ANC and the Republic Cde J.G Zuma announced the establishment of a task team to investigate problems facing students in various tertiary institutions across the country.  We expect the task team to find long-lasting solutions to the issue of financial exclusion and problems associated with National Students Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS). We will work with the Progressive Youth Alliance Partners across the country to ensure that students are consulted widely. We want the work of this task team to be transparent and its final report to reflect the views of students, especially those who come from previously disadvantaged communities.

Economic Transformation

Throughout the NGC, the ANCYL successfully lobbied for the programme of the economic transformation which will translate to economic freedom in our lifetime. Now that we have achieved freedom and democracy, we must use the political power in our hands to achieve economic emancipation for many of our people who remain trapped in abject poverty. This is the responsibility that we dare not relegate to future generation because the fight for political freedom was not relegated to us.

Economic freedom in our lifetime refers to a state of complete economic emancipation - to live free of oppression and prejudice based on social status, race, class and economic considerations.

The ANCYL will want to share with the youth of the country that our call of decentralizing the NYDA was accepted by the ANC NGC. We want to share with the youth of this country that come 2017 we will concretize this idea as resolution of ANC Conference for implementation in 2019. The ANCYL will embark on a campaign to ensure that the National Development Agency becomes a vehicle through which the youth of this country especially in townships and rural areas are given meaningful economic opportunities by attaining an increase in the Agency’s budget allocation.

It is the view of the ANCYL that there needs to be a long-term planning on youth development. To this end, the ANCYL working with Progressive Youth Alliance Partners will engage the ANC to ensure that Provincial Government departments and municipalities across the country have Youth Development Directorates Units that will be managed by Youth Managers.

Flowing from the resolutions on economic transformation, the ANCYL will further embark on “youth entrepreneurship development program” as part of efforts aimed at encouraging the youth to be job creators instead of being “job hunters”. We will lobby government to work with funding agencies and banking institutions to provide “entrepreneur funding schemes” to youth owned business enterprises..  The distance between established businesses and youth owned businesses must be bridged, after all the youth that does not value it youth deserve no future.

Peace and Stability

As the ANCYL we believe that Peace and Stability is a perquisite for the creation of a prosperous country. Is for this reason that we are determined to work with ANC-led government to create youth cadres who will work in their communities, especially amongst the youth to create and promote positive human values and behavioral changes that will result in the reduction of crime and social ills.

Crime is the biggest threat to this hard worn freedom and democracy that the then youth of this country paid their lives for.  It is for this reason that flowing from the NGC resolutions - we will launch the United Youth Front against Crime campaign as part of unifying young people to protect our freedom and democracy.

We call upon the ANC government in line with ANC NGC to fight all crimes particularly those that threaten our peace, stability and jobs in South Africa. We are happy that the ANC NGC has finally agreed to look into the issue of security companies that are owned outside our bounders for they are security risk that might course instability in this country.

We encourage young people to use the social media to report crime and to create crime awareness within communities.  Through social media, we want to expose kingpins and drug dealers who are recruiting desperate young people for drug trafficking and to commit violent crime such armed robberies and car hijackings of luxury motor vehicles.

Recently a young lady was arrested at OR Tambo International on her return from Dubai. Few years ago many young stars were arrested overseas for drug trafficking including a young lady from Wentworth Township that was executed overseas for the same offence. This is an alarming clear indication that South Africa has been rapidly integrated into the global drug trade.

As the ANCYL we call on the ANC-led government to strengthen the partnership amongst all the criminal justice agencies, government departments, local authorities, academics, traditional leaders, religious organizations, schools, parents, sports groups, the media and the private sector.  All these players must provide the necessary support for the execution of the programme under the auspices of the United Youth Front against Crime.

Social Transformation, International Relations and Commonwealth Games

Resolutions on social transformation and international relations form the basis for the ANCYL to undertake to champion initiatives that will ensure partnerships between South African youth sporting teams with youth sporting teams from the continent and all countries that we have bilateral relations with.

We will lobby for the twinning arrangements amongst youth clubs, academic institutions and cities as part of creating the next generation of sports stars.

Since our readmission to international sports after years of isolation, as the country we must always be in search of the world’s best practices that will assist in improving the quality of sports in this country.

As we approach the Commonwealth Games, the ANCYL will lobby government and the private sector including academic institutions to construct high performance centers in the townships and in rural areas that will enhance the natural speed and strength of our sports stars at a very young age in time for the games.

We are also mindful of the fact that soccer can be used as a tool to address socio-economic challenges. We call on private companies to use their social responsibility initiatives to ensure that young people are assisted with resources so that sports become their integral part of their lives.

We further recognize, as the ANCYL, the fact that sports can be used to ensure youth behavioral change, to create awareness around HIV and Aids and to improving health and well-being of young people.

Critically, we call on the private sector, government, sports associations and all roll-players to work with young people to ensure that soccer is used as a to reduce high levels of crime in the country.

Local Government Elections

The ANCYL took a resolution that we must work towards ensuring that 40 % of councilors represent the youth as the population of this country is largely young. Progress has been registered by various municipalities in the area of creating road access for many communities and provision of tarred roads and construction of roads in previously inaccessible areas including pedestrian bridges to create access to schools and clinics. We have seen many communities that were previously neglected having access to electricity and water.

Leading up the Local Government Elections, we will campaign for the youth to be elected into councils of local municipalities to be mayors and speakers. Coming out of this ANC NGC we are pleased to let the youth know that we have secured 20% representation of young people in all governance structures of which, the ANC Youth league will have an opportunity to lobby for a further 20% in the 2017 National conference to secure 40% representation of young people in structures of governance. The ANC NGC is said that young people of South Africa must await the appointments of responsible young councilors, speakers, deputy mayors and Mayors. We are the future and no one can stop us. Nothing about us without us.     

Mayors and councilors must need to mobilize community participation in the structures of governance such as hospital boards and clinic committees. Communities should also participate in grass roots programmes to ensure access to quality services and the fight against serious diseases such HIV and AIDS, TB, diseases of lifestyles, cancers etc. This is part of the integrated approach to governance that is being promoted by the ANC led government. 

We will ensure that we campaign for youth councilors that are well versed with the provisions of the National Health Insurance and the National Development Plan. The lack of requisite skills on the part of councilors has always been cited as a root cause for the mismanagement of public funds. The ANCYL will ensure that youth leaders deployed to municipalities have enough capacity and skills to champion service delivery without flouting good governance practices.

Going to local government election we are not willing to allow the Nelson Mandela Municipality to be led by anyone besides the ANC, so goes for Tshwane and Johannesburg. Moving we will intensify the ANC campaign as the ANCYL preparing for 2016. We are certain that in one of the aforesaid municipalities we will have young speaker, deputy mayor and mayor.

#wearethefuture

#ANCYL

Statement issued by Mlondi Mkhize, ANCYL National Spokesperson, 14 October 2015