Young people take the initiative

Young people in Africa face obstacles - poverty, war, discrimination - to a better life and to fulfilling their dreams. In frustration some resort to joining militias or becoming petty criminals or prostitutes in search of friendship, protection and food. The great majority do not want this, however; they want to get better educated and earn a living.

Formal training courses, even if accessible and affordable, are often too long and inflexible and often less useful for girls who generally cannot leave home or take the same risks as boys.

Drop-in centres

Echo Bravo, an organisation of educationalists in Eastern Africa, helps young people get an education in difficult circumstances. In north-west Uganda Echo Bravo provides drop-in ‘education bases’, where young people can follow courses, hold meetings, keep shared resources and feel at home. It has worked particularly well in refugee camps where young people use the base to read or run sports and musical groups.

Adding value

The ability to drive, computer and business knowledge, or an additional language add value to a person’s skills. In the Congo and Uganda a two-day bee-keeping course helps people onto the first step of the economic ladder. A workshop on ‘pleasing the customer’ encourages craftsmen to introduce variety into their products after finally asking customers what they want.

Creating their own opportunities

Young people teach each other and form unions or associations to learn skills. They gain confidence amongst peers. From 'boda-boda' bicycle taxi riders to barbequed-chicken sellers and those carrying out door-to-door trade, young people in Uganda are forming associations: they set standards and are proud of their knowledge and services; they learn leadership, management and business skills.

Youth initiatives are undermined

Governments and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), however, lag far behind young people's survival and leadership trends. A government labels an association of informal traders ‘hawkers’ and drives them off the streets rather than recognise them as possible future entrepreneurs. NGOs, despite their high-profile campaigns for empowerment, can be reluctant to recognise that young people can and want to take the initiative.

Learning a skill

In Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), teenage AIDS orphans are deliberately dropping out of school to work and keep their younger brothers and sisters in school. When asked what they need, those aspiring to become hairdressers, for instance, say a set of scissors, combs and electric razor to take to friends’ salons to learn more skills as apprentices.

Young people are inventive

Throughout Africa the business of mobile phone repairs fully illustrates the inventiveness of young people as they react to the market they are living in. No older ‘experts’ set the agenda; no school yet offers a course. Repairers, always young, teach each other and the person with knowledge gains respect as he passes on a particular skill, even though it may reduce his own business.

Learning from each other

In the eastern DRC, ravaged by war, young people have set up FM radio stations using old walkie-talkies and cassette players. In Bunia, Radio Canal Revelation provides what the audience wants on the tiny income they get from passing on greetings messages. It has also become an informal journalism school, where students critique each others' programmes.

What help is needed?

Even small investments opens the door: a 70 generator would help the radio station. We need to take risks. Young people who are already identifying problems and working out solutions have to be trusted. Those who wish to help them need to accept that mistakes will be made, money may be lost but everyone will learn lessons.

Barry Sesnan
Echo Bravo
P O Box 156
Entebbe
Uganda
Bsesnan@yahoo.com
www.echobravo.net

See also

Skills training for youth, Forced Migration Review 20, by Barry Sesnan, Graham Wood, Marina López Anselme and Ann Avery, 2004
www.fmreview.org/FMRpdfs/FMR20/FMR2016.pdf

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