THE YOUTH AND THE AFRICAN PEER REVIEW MECHANISM (APRM) IN ZAMBIA

By Guess Nyirenda

The youth are a strategic reserve of energy, skills and innovation key to the success of development strategies and plans at all levels of society. The Zambia Youth Policy recognizes youth as all persons between the age of 18 and 35. Zambia is party to the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), a process for monitoring the governance of the country one to which the youth are a crucial stakeholder.

It is mainly at the youthful stage in life that one can make or break their future with consequences spilling over to the community and the nation as a whole. It is thus acceptable to conclude that life’s purpose is defined and groomed in the youthful years.

Despite the competitive edge that being youthful provides, the youth in Zambia are faced with enormous challenges. Among the problems that the youth face are: Unemployment, lack of guidance, delinquency, drug abuse, alcohol, crime and prostitution and teenage pregnancies. Others include, lack of recreational facilities and due to disintegration of the family as a nucleus of socio-economic development, lack of skills, training and experience to enable them obtain formal employment and/or finance to engage in self employment and as already stated marginalized/excluded socially, economically and even politically from national development.

Picture courtrsey ofyouthdeved.ie 

According to the National Youth Policy, 68% of the Zambian population is aged between 15 and 25 years. It is quite clear that about 75% of the unemployed are the youth. At least 100,000 young people graduate from different institutions of learning each year whereas approximately 150,000 other (totaling 250,000) enter into the labour market every year with or no hope of finding formal employment. Most of these enter without technical or entrepreneurial skills which can enable them go into potentially gainful self-employment. According to Kwaku Osei-Hwedie and Muna Ndulo in their book “Studies in youth and development”, youth unemployment, in particular, is identified as a serious national problem that all countries, especially those in the developing countries, are challenged with and need to resolve urgently. The above statistics should worry every Zambians concerned about their welfare and the future of the nation as a whole.

The APRM which is a redefining moment for Africa, but more so for individual countries on this continent, is one such initiative that the youth of Zambia should seriously place their hope in. In agreement with the APRM, Kwaku Osei-Hwedie and Muna Ndulo further write that youth development is a task that no country can afford to ignore, or attempt without the necessary resources, co-coordinated efforts and seriousness that it deserves. Kwaku Osei-Hwedie and Muna Ndulo furthermore note that youth problems require concerned efforts from governments, communities, individuals, academicians, international as well as local organizations and the youth themselves.

One of the primary objectives of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) which has been taken on on the APRM is the need to accelerate the empowerment of the youth among other vulnerable and marginalized stakeholder groups. The APRM which is a self-assessment and monitoring tool, in terms of governance holistically, aims at fostering the adoption of policies, standards and practices that will lead to political stability, high economic growth, sustainable development and accelerated regional and economic integration. Zambia is examining her national systems of governance through the APRM with the view of identifying the strengths, weaknesses and proposing remedies in order to improve Zambia’s governance. This will be achieved through the formulation and implementation of laws, policies and practices that will answer the challenges facing the youth in Zambia. These measures include:

(i)            Employability-investing in education and vocational training for young people and improve the impact of this investment. Under this area the APRM should aim at taking the aspirations of all categories (i.e. out of school, school dropouts, in school) in an inclusive manner. The APRM should also highlight the need for more youth resource centres to be built while at the same time the already existing one are enhance.

(ii)          Equality of opportunities-all the youth regardless of their status in society, gender, level of education etc, should have equal and equitable opportunities as it were;

(iii)         Entrepreneurship- the APRM process should result in the adoption of right policies, best practices and putting up of structures that will make it easier for the youth to start and run enterprises in order to provide more and better jobs. The youth enterprise and entrepreneurship can be enhanced through already existing institutions among them the Citizen’s Economic Empowerment Commission (CEEC); (iv) Employment creation-the APRM will ensure that employment creation is placed at the center of macro-economic policy.

The Zambian youth are inextricably linked to the national developmental agenda. They must be part and parcel of the SWOT analysis of the country’s governance system.  This mechanism will enable the youth to easily take over leadership from the older generation. The APRM is a national process. It is not a government lone process. It is not a partisan process. It is a national process. This therefore entails that all should fully participate. There are many programmes that have been conducted in Zambia before and they have gone, however, the APRM is not a programme but a process that has come to stay with the view of continuously improving on our governance and the well being of the citizens as Zambia specifically and Africa generally.   

 About the Author:

Guess is the Executive Director Operation Young Vote and chairperson: APRM NPoA Implementation Monitoring CSOs Coalition