RNM youth structure labelled as bogus

The newly elected structure of the Ray Nkonyeni Municipality Youth Development Council has been labelled as bogus.

Sphelele Owen Cele was elected as the council’s chairperson, Nonku Shazi as deputy chair, Wonder Shinga as secretary, Bhekisisa Nyawose (deputy secretary), Mthokozisi Mbuthumo (treasurer) during the Ray Nkonyeni Municipality Youth Development Summit held in Scottburgh recently.
Lindokuhle Hadebe of Ward 5 who has written to the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA) calling for the disbandment of the youth development council told Fever that the structure is bogus because the manner in which they elected themselves did not involve young people of RNM.

“We found that the proper communication channels used to raise awareness on the elections were not followed. There was no use of loud hailers, posters on social media, or anything of that sort that would inform young people at a ward level that there is this sort of youth development structure that needs to be elected. If young people are informed then they will be able to elect people who will be delegates of the ward to vote for the structure. All those processes were not communicated, so if young people did not know about the elections, that means the structure is bogus,” said Habebe.

Another young person from ward 27 who did not want to be named told Fever that they were once misled into thinking that they were being transported from Gamalakhe to KwaNositha for a community meeting about jobs for young people, only to find that they were being transported to vote for ward 27’s Youth Development Forum which will be legible to contest in the RNM Youth Development Summit.
“Young people were angry, they did not want to be part of it since they felt misled into voting for people who did not even care that the only reason they left their homes was because of a potential job opportunity,” she said.
Other young people have also argued that the RNM Youth Development Council is very political, saying that it is mostly dominated by ANC members.

Speaking to Fever, newly elected secretary of the Youth Development Council, Wonder Shinga said with the help of the RNM Youth Office, they go to each ward of the municipality to elect people to be part of the ward’s Youth Development Forum that reports directly to council.
“This is to ensure that each voting district is represented to ensure that there is no corner of the ward that does not have access to the council. It sometimes happens that we get to a ward and there are not enough people and in that case, we cannot elect a youth development forum. Young people in wards that are located in suburban areas are hardly part of this because there are not enough young people to form a forum. For the recent summit, 31 wards voted for the new structure and wards 12, 16, 18, and 19 were not part of the elections,” said Shinga.
He added that the development youth council is not political and it is not dominated by the ANC, saying that they have councillors from the EFF and IFP represented at the RNM Youth Development Council.
Shinga said the council is a vanguard for young people, saying that they are willing to assist young people with information and anything they can regardless of the political party they are affiliated to.

HAVE YOUR SAY

Like the South Coast Fever’s Facebook page