Reporter’s Notebook | Youths need more than a seat at the table
Published:Monday | July 23, 2018 | 12:00 AM
There is no doubt that the participation of youth in governance has increased over the past few years, but there is still a far way to go.
As Jermaine Porter, former deputy chairman of the National Youth Council puts it, for many years, millennials did not have a seat at the table.
"There were days when we were invited to a meeting and they would say, '50 or 100 young persons came to the meeting', but at the end of the meeting, it was just a public relations stunt. So you would leave the meeting with really nothing much being done," declared Porter.
The Government introduced the Jamaica House Fellowship and Youth Advisory Council, which were designed to foster meaningful interaction between youth and technocrats and allow young persons to help shape policies to be implemented.
However, the Government has not comprehensively articulated the ways in which these youth have added value in tangible ways.
This would help to disrupt the narrative that youth participation in governance is simply a talk shop, and it could spark interest in other millennials for them to contribute to nation building.
That has been underscored by Dr Terri-Ann Gilbert-Roberts, research fellow at the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute for Social and Economic Studies, who is adamant that avenues for youth participation at the local government level need to be widened and strengthened.
YOUTH ACTIVISM COMPLETELY DECIMATED
"Right across the region, the local base of youth activism has been completely decimated, and that's the problem. You have these young people, who may be popular, may be elitist in terms of having a certain socio-economic profile, and there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is, there is nobody at the local level to keep them accountable," said Gilbert-Roberts.
Floyd Green, minister of state in charge of youth, has argued that the Youth Parliament, which was overhauled based on recommendations from youth advisers, should help to bridge that gap at the community level.
"They would have given me a raft of suggestions like expanding the number of parliamentarians, assigning parliamentarians to constituencies, reworking the Youth Parliament so that the parliamentary presentation is done after the year of service and not upon selection," said Green.
There are 100 youth parliamentarians who are tasked with implementing projects in their communities ahead of the next sitting in November.
Green seems to be on the right track, and it appears that he understands that the 2030 vision of making Jamaica the place of choice to live, work, raise families, and do business will not be achieved without the full participation of youth.