MBOMBELA – The national leadership of the ANC is in Mpumalanga. Hlengiwe Ngomane had the opportunity to interview Mr Gwede Mantashe about the manifesto launch, which will take place this Saturday at Mbombela Stadium.
One might wonder why it would be important for young people to know what he thinks. Well, Mantashe is the secretary general of the ruling party and by that, we can never ignore an opportunity to find out what he thinks of young people, because we believe that what he has to say will give us a hint about what the ruling party has in store for the youth.
On January 1 this year the Employment Tax Incentive Bill, commonly known as the youth wage subsidy, came into effect. Mantashe refuses to use that term because he feels it is not a true reflection of the policy. He uses the term “youth employment support scheme,” in that way it appends the youth wage subsidy, skills development, extended public works programmes and so on, all staunched towards comprehensive youth development.
Ngomane: I know you are not going to pre-empt on the manifesto now, but please share with our readers what the ANC plans for the young citizens of South Africa for the next five years. Should we expect anything that will speak to the youth?
Mantashe: The manifesto will have a lot on youth unemployment. What people do not realise is that the ANC is moving forwards, not backwards. We are connecting the dots. The University of Mpumalanga was in the 2009 manifesto as a dream. Today we no longer say we will build a university, we are talking about progress on the construction. Hence my argument around the ‘youth wage subsidy’ term. If you have been paying attention you will realise that univeristy, the youth-employment support scheme and many others are a series of programmes that we have put in place to make sure that our young people are empowered. Youth unemployment is a very broad subject and cannot be discussed in isolation. Rest assured that it is in the agenda of the ANC to elevate programmes that seek to address the socio-economic freedom of youth.
Ngomane: The National Development Plan (NDP) Vision 2030 is a much talked-about document. In fact, it has been criticised a lot. Do you think people understand what is in the document, especially young people?
Mantashe: What I can tell you is that young people who have decided to play deaf are going to have only themselves to blame in the near future.
The ANC has taken its time in the development of the NDP, and it will be very unfortunate if youngsters do not familiarise themselves with the document. It is a plan, not a policy and we cannot avoid talking abut it.
Remember that a plan has three elements: diagnosis, policies and action and having said that, in the NDP we admit as the ANC government that we have done well and still have a lot of challenges that we know very well (diagnosis), the same document also gives us guidelines on what we need to do moving forward, hence the youth wage subsidy (policy) and many others that are yet to come. Now what we need to do is implement these things so that we can identify the shortcomings of this plan and be able to adapt them to suit the needs of young people.
Ngomane: What do you have to say to young people who have decided not to vote?
Mantashe: Ignorance has its own price. If Madiba spent so many years in jail for people to misuse this democracy, then it would be very sad. No person can tell me they do not see what the ANC has done.
I was actually telling that to a group of women in the Eastern Cape who asked me what the ANC has done. That question only makes sense to me if it is asked by a blind person who cannot see when lights go on. Electricity and water have become simple things to appreciate for many, but believe me, if you find a 50- or 60-year-old person and ask them about the conditions in which they lived before, they will tell you. Then people will say old people are loyal because of the grants; old people know what this land used to be like. That is why they appreciate it and love the ANC so much. I think that they are actually misled by the born-free term.
I feel that term is very wrong because young people do not realise that it is used as a liberal propaganda to make them lose identity. Young people must take pride in themselves. This labelling that they are subjected to is the one that is misleading them, because if we call these ones born-frees, what are we going to call those who will be born in the next 10 years; born-flats? This is the time when young people need to stand up and take charge. The ANC is very clear, young people are the future of this country and they are on the top of our priority.
