Jabulani Ndlovu, a member of the mayoral council for planning and development of the Nkomazi Local Municipality, recently reflected on June, Youth Month, and the struggles faced by today’s youth.
Affectionately known to his peers as JB, he talked to Corridor Gazette Express about what this month means to him as a young person.
Corridor Gazette Express (CGE): What does Youth Month mean to you?
Jabulani Ndlovu (JN): The month of June means the birth of freedom through youth activism for young people in Nkomazi and the country as a whole. It has, however, lost its value, because the hardships faced by the youth are even worse today. What is left of it now is the memory of what was, because young people are still in difficult conditions. Another challenge is we are expecting the system to do something for us, yet we are not proactive enough, comparatively speaking to the youth of 1976. There’s no longer youth activism, and that is painful for me.
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CGE: Do you feel our struggles today might be a little harder than the youths’ in 1976?
JN: The struggles of today are different to back then. In 1976, they fought the system of education, and now, even after all that was fought for, we’re still suffering. Looking at everything in general, in a holistic manner, one would say we are worse off. Things seem to be improving, but there are a lot of people suffering, maybe due to overpopulation in Nkomazi, looking at Mozambique and eSwatini bordering us and the illegal immigrants.
CGE: Do you think we’re getting better or worse?
JN: It’s difficult to say, because all that we have now, we didn’t have before. There’s an improvement in all spheres. However, Nkomazi has a high unemployment rate and youth activism is at its lowest. We don’t have tertiary institutions this side to motivate people enough about the importance of education. The general youth in Nkomazi are just demoralised, and of course, some are trying, but there aren’t many opportunities here. We have young people going to other provinces for education, and that’s just about a third of the youth. The remaining two-thirds are not exposed to what the 1976 youth fought for.
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There is also the issue of nightlife and alcohol consumption, which generally affects the whole country and sways us into poverty bit by bit. This is another addition to things dragging us down compared to the activists of 1976 and how they genuinely fought against the systems of oppression. These days it’s difficult, because there’s also class struggles among us. Our problems are multidimensional now. More things divide us than the common struggles of 1976.
CGE: What would you like to say to the youth as motivation?
JN: We must try in every possible way to study and be well equipped for the world in which we live. We must be ready to learn new skills and be exposed to the politics of today so that we can decide on our future. Young people in Nkomazi must be activists like those of 1976 and defend all the hard-earned gains. We can’t go back to dreadful conditions now. It is the youth that must take centre stage to decide their lives for tomorrow. That way Nkomazi can be great again.
