Reining in rogue youths

The years 2014 and 2015 marked a period in Guyana’s post-independence history where political activism and consciousness among the country’s youth population was at its peak. Youths utilised every opportunity and media platform to sound their voices for socio-political change while bluntly demanding that the installation via purely democratic means of a new government that put the needs of its people first.
A major of that youth population strongly felt that “it was time” for them to speak out against the perceived diabolic failures of the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) as far as advancing youth development and social quality were concerned. This led to widespread protests about the need for youths to be included in key decisions which ultimately affect their overall growth and future.
It saw the establishment of key pressure and interest groups at various levels of society which lobbied the Donald Ramotar Administration for immediate changes as far as equal access to education and scholarships were concerned. They demanded the further curricula modernisation and infrastructural development of the University of Guyana as many expressed worry about the poor state of affairs of the entity. Widespread concern was also raised about the state of corruption, joblessness, mismanagement, poverty and crime during the rule of successive PPP Governments.
The Blue Caps sprung up and shot to fame with the support of some of the county’s most influence young adults and leaders. There were also town hall meetings and local programmes, tailored as well as funded – if not completely conceptualised by USAID and other American interests – to galvanise support against the PPP amongst youths.
And as expected, the then Opposition capitalised on those opportunities and launched an offensive which saw docile and naive youths being used as political foot soldiers to preach the A Partnership for National Unity/Alliance For Change’s (APNU/AFC) policy messages. They were catapulted to the limelight with the coalition’s leaders like Christopher Jones, James Bond, Malika Ramsey, Thandi McAllister, Trevor Thomas and others promising them betterment under the ruler ship of a coalition Government. Indeed, Berbice’s Mark Ross and Essequibo’s Ganesh Manhipaul were also instrumental in misleading thousands of young people in their respective counties about what would be taking place under a Granger-Nagamootoo Government.
The PPP was warned long before the elections by its own youths who diligently lobbied the party internally to do more to secure the youth vote. Ideas were put forward by youths with modern ideologies and viewpoints about what the Party needed to do on the campaign trail to increase its appeal to a seemingly resentful youth population. The truth is, the relics in the Party blocked every attempt to revolutionise and positively reform the party game-plan for attracting more youth voters. The rest is history.
It is now years into the ruler ship of the coalition Government and the state of the Guyanese youth has not improved even though they handed David Granger and Joseph Harmon the elections on a platter. Things have gone from mildly bad under the PPP as far as youth development is concerned to worse under the stewardship of the fatal Rupert Roopnaraine and Nicolette Henry stewardship of the education sector. UG is still in a state of disrepair and is starved of funds. It still lacks creativity and modern vision with respect to its core curriculum content. UG is now forced to raise its tuition fees and demonising poor youths who took loans to be able to attain a tertiary education. And there is now VAT on private education.
Joblessness, poverty and corruption are reaching alarming levels under this regime and the National Youth Policy which the APNU/AFC Government produced is poor by any standard. Value for money was certainly not attained when one peruses this piecemeal document. Youth crime and violence have also skyrocketed under this militaristic regime which is slowly mirroring a neo-dictatorship. What is even more disappointing is the fact that those very young people who put whatever credibility they had on the line for the APNU/AFC while campaigning during the elections are now sidelined. They are occupying back offices and doing unimpressive work in all sorts of fabricated portfolios as they struggle to save face.
They are unimportant and irrelevant in the scheme of things as older and more experienced former military comrades enjoy the largess of their labour. In short, they are now condemned to silence having been disgraced and outmanoeuvred by the dinosaurs in their parties. The wider youth population who voted for the coalition have now lost their voices and appears to be in retreat after what was supposed to be a big triumph and period of change.
Now is the time for the PPP to strike now by exposing those who further enslave the wider youth population to their current socio-economic hardship under the ruler ship of Mr Granger-Harmon. The PPP must not fail to reorganise its youth arm to confront these challenges via social media and the main stream media. The older politicians in the party needs new faces by their side to achieve buy-in from now even more indecisive and resentful population. The PPP must deliver the change youths begged for – it must be their knight in shining amour.