10/12/2013
Jubilee Celebrations Greetings and Happy 50th Jamhuri Day,
Hereunder, the 10 issues that all of us must find a way of addressing in the New Year 2014, to guarantee youth empowerment and development.
ISSUE 1: OPERATIONALISATION OF THE NATIONAL YOUTH COUNCIL
Today 10th December, 2013 is exactly one year since the first ever National Youth Council came into being in Kenya. This was a result of 15 years of toil dating as far back as 1997 when the youth of this country started in earnest a struggle to have an official platform and voice to engage the government, the world and stakeholders.
And despite this long quest by subsequent generations of youth to have a National Youth Council in place, the regimes in the past have been indifferent to this idea. And this partly informs the state of the National Youth Council one year since its formation.
The council is basically a brief case parastatal without even the very basic of structures. As I write this, the council is housed by the Directorate of Youth Affairs, its only 7 staff are forwarded from government and have their allegiance and commitment to their seconders and not the council. The council has a budget of 34 Million that can't set up even an amateur of a state agency, that it is. Whats more complex is that the council has no substantive CEO and lacks integral HR personnel like procurement, the council doesn't even have a bank account.
the council has however made some strides even with the myriad of challenges its facing; It has a development a five year strategic plan, has managed to raise support in form of appropriation in aid, celebrated the international youth week and day, it has done a couple of trainings to its board members and staff, it has negotiated a deal with Safaricom to give M-pesa dealerships/franchises to 5000 youth groups (100 youth groups per county) starting January 2014, has been able to lobby for several youth mainstreaming in legislation and policies, and is currently together with DYA working on the TORs of reviewing the National Youth Policy.
NEED OF THE HOUR: The National Youth Council needs urgent operationalisation to fully undertake its mandate as a policy, advisory and research institution of youth affairs in the country. The council needs three things, even four and they are; systems, capacity, resources and political goodwill. Over and above the council needs support from the youth and everyone to be able to stand on its feet.
ISSUE 2: YOUTH FUNCTION (DEVOLUTION VS. NATIONAL)
Whereas president Uhuru has been particular about youth empowerment, the government has not been able to domicile the youth function anywhere as yet. Transition Authority has four categories of unction; a) National Exclusive, b) County Exclusive, c) Shared (National and County) and d) Unplaced. Now the youth function in government formation and structure is neither national nor county and as such I can authoritatively state its "unplaced" or even maybe displaced. County Youth Directors (CYDs), District Youth Officers (DYOs) and other Youth development officers have had no budget to even buy a Biro pen and they idle in thoer offices without anything to do for the simple reason because they are uncertain about their status; whether county or national. From the National Office they are told to go to counties and the counties tell them they don't belong there.
NEED OF THE HOUR: The government should once and for all decide where the youth function belongs and fund it.
ISSUE 3: DIRECTORATE OF YOUTH AFFAIRS (DYA)
Perhaps its at DYA that the rain started beating the youth function. The DYA is yet to have any visible structures, apart from the director who was recently appointed, the directorate doesn't even have a deputy director!
NEED OF THE HOUR: The Directorate of Youth Affairs needs to be structured and functional.
ISSUE 4: YOUTH MINISTRY
The President for the love and concern of the youth of Kenya wanted the youth function to be right under the presidency and thus had it put under the ministry of Devolution and Planning. The last few months have proved that Devolution and Planning is such a huge and complex docket that the youth affairs docket is not getting sufficient attention and Issues 1,2 and 3 attest. Whereas the government was kin on mainstreaming the youth function across all ministries, its evident that was with other forms of mainstreaming that haven't been successful, the youth function is everywhere and nowhere in particular. One undeniable fact is that the youth affairs function has taken a serious beating with new structure and is not getting sufficient attention at the cabinet level, ministerial level, at the directorate and of-course at the grassroots its as dead as dodo.
NEED OF THE HOUR: The president should rethink the youth function in his government formation structure and create another ministry that will exclusively address youth challenge. The President and Deputy President haven't exhausted the 22 ministries allowed of them by the constitution. Its still possible to custom make a ministry for youth. On the same note the youth (18 and 35) missed out on both a cabinet slot and that of Principle Secretary, the president should use this opportunity to have at-least one person within the definition of youth in his cabinet and another as a PS.
ISSUE 5: 30% GOVERNMENT PROCUREMENT OPPORTUNITIES TO YOUTH, WOMEN AND PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES
This is apparently one of the boldest initiatives by the Jubilee government, its in the excess of 220 Billion shillings worth of business reserved for youth and other marginalized groups. The program however is open to abuse because it lacks necessary safety nets. The most likely to lose out on this are youth and persons with disabilities who face a plethora of challenges as they try to access this once in a life time opportunity. There's need for a proper mechanism to monitor, evaluate, review and even better it. Its also not so open to these groups that are out of Nairobi, it needs serious decentralization even though an attempt has been made to have it online, there are still many challenges to the majority of youth who don't reside in Nairobi especially on the fronts concerning necessities like business registration, tax compliance certificates, professional services certification et al.
NEED OF THE HOUR: AGPO NEEDS PROPER LEGAL AND STRUCTURAL FRAMEWORKS.
ISSUE 6: UWEZO FUND (6 BILLION)
The History of this fund is well known and without going into details its important to note that the proposed structure of disbursing the 6 billion is largely a copy and paste of what Women Enterprise Fund (WEF) and Youth Enterprise Development Fund (YEDF) does; a duplication in one too many ways.
Its plausible that parliament ensured that youth through NYC get representation (of two slots) at the Oversight Board, however at the constituency management board, youth representation is vague only stating that (one of the five board members appointed by the MP will be a youth).
But the bond of contention is that three months since the president launched Uwezo Fund in an elaborate and hyped launch, there is still nothing on the ground and the youth are restless and complaining. Suffice the reason as to why the head of state should be made to launch something that is non available on the ground and has no legal framework as yet, it beats all logic. In fact criminal elements have been going around in some areas like Kiambu County with fake Uwezo application forms and luring young people to apply and pay 2000 shillings so that they qualify for the loans.
NEED OF THE HOUR: Uwezo Fund should be rolled out fast, youth as an integral part of the fund should have representation at the constituency board increased and expressly ring-fenced.
ISSUE 7: GOVT JOBS RATIONALIZATION VS. THE I MILLION JOB PROMISE
In a bid to cub spiraling national wage bill, the government has frozen hiring in the civil service and there is talk of retrenchment. Three quick points here; a) whereas its important to arrest the ballooning of the wage bill, blanket ban will affect thousands of young people fresh from schools and colleges from accessing jobs in the civil service. This development in one too many ways goes contrary to the promise by this government to create 1 million jobs per year.
NEED OF THE HOUR: There's need to review the civil service rationalization process in consultation with all stakeholders.
ISSUE 8: YOUTH ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT FUND (YEDF)
The Abidkadir led SCAC committee has proposed merging several state corporation still in the sprit of arresting the run a way national wage bill. Among those proposed for merging is the YEDF commonly referred to as youth fund. Still, this proposal however noble should be rethought. merging YEDF, WEF, Micro and Small Enterprises Authority Fund and Uwezo will in the long run cost custom-made service to the youth and women. The wisdom that informed having Youth Fund as one of the flagship project under the social pillar in the first medium term plan of vision 2030 still applies today. Access to credit, market and linkages by the youth are distinctly different from other groups. Whereas its true the Fund has had operational challenges, all it needs is restructuring and empowering as opposed to scraping it all together, in fact in the recent past the fund has picked up and is doing so well .Doing away with YEDF is neither safe nor wise.
On this point, its only fair to remind you of Jubilee Government's Manifesto's promise to annually allocate 2.5% of national revenues to a national youth fund to support youth owned businesses. This is perhaps the first promise by President Uhuru and Deputy President Ruto that has been "forgotten". 2.5% of National revenue at current rates is in the regions 20 Billion Kenya Shillings and this amount if channeled to the Youth Fund will do more than create the i million jobs promised in the manifesto and thus grow the economy.
NEED OF THE HOUR: RETAIN YOUTH FUND AS AN ENTITY and MAKE HAPPEN THE 2.5% YOUTH FUND PROMISE
ISSUE 9: ROLE OF YOUTH IN VISION 2030 (MTP II)
The recently launched medium Term Plan 2 of Kenya's Vision 2030 is "tokenistic" in terms of the role the youth will play in its realization. Apart from a few proposed legal and policy documents there's little.
NEED OF THE HOUR: THERE'S NEED FOR DIALOGUE, REVIEW AND CONVERSATIONS ON THE ROLE OF YOUTH IN VISION 2030
ISSUE 10: SAFE GUARDING THE YOUTH GAINS IN THE CONSTITUTION OF KENYA, 2010
The constitution of Kenya, 2010 is perhaps the best thing to ever happen to Kenya after independence. And narrowing down to youth, the place and potential of article 55 of the constitution and other provisions that have created platforms for youth participation, inclusion and representation in national development has not been exploited to the full. All and sundry have a role to make sure that the gains given by the new constitution are fully utilized.
This write up is meant for inform and spur conversations amongst youth sector stakeholders, youth and even government. Lets get talking and thinking about solutions to the challenges the sector faces and come up with new and grand initiatives to empower the youth of Kenya who by the way will be 24 million in number come 2017 and 67% of the entire population in 8 years.
The issues that will matter for the youth in 2014.
