Fifty years after the class of 1976 relied strictly on courage and dreams to confront the apartheid regime, government is challenging today’s youth to adopt a new generational mission to leverage State-backed digital platforms and funding networks to achieve financial liberation.
Speaking during a Government Communication and Information System (GCIS) webinar on government opportunities for youth, Deputy Government Spokesperson William Baloyi emphasised that while the fundamental resilience of South African youth remains unchanged, the tools available to them have evolved dramatically.
“The generation of 1976 had a mission, and the mission was to fight the unjust system of education. Today’s youth, I think, also have to have a generational mission.
“Today’s youth have platforms, opportunities, and other avenues that the government has provided. Today’s youth… have vehicles that they can use, but they should carry with them that courage and those dreams,” he said.
Those vehicles available to youth include, among others:
- The Presidential Youth Employment Intervention.
- The National Youth Development Agency.
- The sayouth.mobi site.
- The National Youth Service.
- The National Youth Empowerment Fund.
“Government remains committed to expanding access to skills development, employment opportunities, entrepreneurship support and funding so that more young people can participate meaningfully in the economy.
“Our policy and our priority, still remains as government, to ensure that the young people are not only encouraged to seek opportunities, but are actively connected to practical pathways that lead to earning.
“We want the youth not only to be job seekers, but to be job creators,” Baloyi stated.
Furthermore, the young people were reminded to remain vigilant against modern digital threats.
While platforms like the zero-rated sayouth.mobi offer free access to verified job and training networks, social media has also given rise to human-trafficking and job scam lures that have trapped desperate citizens abroad.
“They promise them good jobs... They have been led to get into the jobs, only to find that those are not the real jobs. Make sure that you are alive to misinformation and disinformation. No young person should be left behind,” Baloyi said.
South Africa recently observed Youth Month in June. It culminates in National Youth Day on June 16, which commemorates the historic 1976 Soweto Uprising against apartheid education policies – SAnews.gov.za
