The Debate on life style Audit a Cope Youth Perspective. What inspired the Youth of Mandela vs Malema (ANC), Mda(Cope), Mazibuko (DA ) and Manamela (SACP)
The COPE Youth has observed a call for an Audit on Life style of Julius Malema and many other leaders, and this has attracted us to write an analysis on the Political Life style of the Youth Leadership in our Country. Many have reduced the glamour of bling of celebrity life style to Julius Malema and his cronies, neglecting a very important Social neglect of what inspires the Political Youth of South Africa across party lines, the ANC Youth , COPE Youth , DA Youth and many other youth formations The Youth of Mandela, Mbeki, and Sisulu was amongst other things inspired by the gallant heroes and heroines of the struggle of our people who fought against the demon of racism and inequality in our country. They were motivated by their commitment to a free and Democratic and prosperous South Africa. Their will to serve the nation and the conviction to the fight against apartheid built them to be the leaders that did not only inspire South Africans but Africa and the world. The Youth of Malema, Mda, Mazibuko and Manamela contrary to the youth of Or Tambo and Mandela is inspired by individual financial growth that has nothing to do with the empowerment of the poor masses of the people of South Africa who continue to live with out food or shelter, the youth of our time spends more of its available time in posture of financial arrogance in exorbitant parties and lavish lifestyle equivalent to the life of royalities,dominated by those who have took short cuts in accumulations of resources and the Malema*s, Mda ,Mazibuko and Manamela without a traceable record of hard work either in their Politics or careers and they remain the models of the current generation. Mandela and his generation of leaders, success and achievement in life of his generation can be traced and valued through their courage and determination in equipping themselves as educated professionals who had the *honour to serve* the People of South Africa in the service of the nation, as well as their love for humanity and freedom. This generation of people was selfless and even when many of them were facing death, they were motivated by their love for freedom and humanity, and they never turned their back on the struggle for freedom. Their love for their people could not be bought by any amount of money and Positions nor threat; they stood not for personal benefit just for the freedom of their people. They never struggle to be Popular, famous nor a statue in society. To them the struggle was a necessary responsibility for generations to come to free all South Africans from poverty and inequality. The Youth of Or Tambo, Sisulu, Mandela, Mhlaba and Govan Mbeki in these historic moments was in the forefront of the cause for justice. However they never forgot their responsibility to empower themselves in the academic area and many other social fronts as part of their Youthfulness. Thabo Mbeki in the Nelson Mandela Lecture, he defines the tendencies of the Malema ,Mda, Mazibuko and Manamela generation accurately that the tendencies of this behaviour of the get rich quickly youth is indeed entrenched on the Value systems of the neo-liberal agenda of promoting an individualistic society. I quote TM *the then white minority rule created and entrenched a social order of individual accumulation including amongst the oppressed ,the deep seated understanding that personal wealth constituted the only true measure of individual and social success*. *..I am arguing that the new order, born of the victory in 1994, inherited a well-entrenched value system that placed individual acquisition of wealth at the very centre of the value system of our society as a whole*. These tendencies of the get rich mentality were perpetuated by the lack of linkages between economic empowerment and the national development priorities of the broader population of our people based on common nationalism. The opportunities of our freedom were defined separately and individualistic through major transactions between the few Black elite, with no collective responsibility in empowering their communities. The Youth of Malema, Manamela, Mda and Mazibuko has had a less focus on the collective development of the Youth of Our Country, many young people live in poverty, due to lack of access education and the high level of unemployment that continue to exclude the energetic youth in the main stream economy in our country. The leaders of the youth in general across party lines are standing on the touch line and just remain praise singers of the leaders of their parties that patronize them for their strength in lobbying support for conferences. The Youth Agenda has been neglected by all these youth leaders, the offices of the National Youth development Agency are not operation the youth can not be serviced since the merger of Umsobomvu and the Youth Commission. All these fellows care about is who is to be elected as President or leader of their Parties. They continue to be used for personal gain and glory. Community work for these Youth leaders has been substituted by the parties and the luxury machines they drive to intimidate and posture in the dusty streets of the poverty stricken community, who sleep with out food and basic clean water. Their narrow excuse is that In these circumstances, personal wealth, and the public communication of the message that we are people of wealth, becomes, at the same time, the means by which we communicate the message that we are worthy citizens of our community, the very exemplars of what defines the product of a liberated South Africa All these leaders claim to be representing the aspirations of the marginalized masses of our people but their conduct is contrary to their theory. We have introduced have a Youth of noise makers with less substance on the issues confronting our People. The Youth leaders we have lack the capacity to articulate, investigate, research and to solve the problems facing our nation. The Youth that leads our ideas is sponsored for a short term project to serve their leaders thus their leadership to the youth does nt inspire the millions of the masses of our people ,in the same way as the youth of Burma ,Cuba, China and Brazil . Lessons from other countries The fall of many liberation movements in Africa and the world was the failure to identify the correct issues that should inspire the Youth in joining their liberation organizations and Political Movements . The parties are challenged to respond to this issue. (General Public Youth Opinion and Perception: I join Politics Because its Classy, I want to be with influential People ,business, I want something new etc).The change of the South African state from an Apartheid state to democratic state ushered in new possibilities for the Youth of our country. What inspired the Youth of the struggle against apartheid has changed now, and the Youth of the democratic breakthrough is inspired by opportunities of freedom. This resulted in the continuing obsession by many to wealth and quick wealth, detaching social responsibility and redistribution. This venom resulted to an obsession, with power which resulted to patronage and later produced nepotism and corruption. The Leadership of Youth is not immune from this demon of the societal contradiction. The Obsession of Power has always been a down fall of the liberation Movement in Africa. In the Past decade the growth in new business initiatives has escalated than Non governmental organisations opened due to the fact that our people view the private sector as the only sector to make quick money for a better life for individuals only, this in the main has been dominated by people who are active in Politics across the board like Julius Malema, Buti Manamela and Anele Mda ,Mazibuko. This interesting development is that this phase has no direct impact to the ordinary people waiting for better services. The above trend is dangerous for a country with a huge gap of inequalities, as the observation for private accumulation and cannot be what inspires its Youth or this cannot be what can be used to inspire the Youth of South Africa. Like the youth of Mandela our youth should be inspired by hard work and sacrifice a sense of patriotism and academic Excellency. The Youth of our country must be inspired by its love of the Service of our people; we must continue to be inspired by our love to defend our freedom and democracy. We must not be inspired by the favours we receive in exchange for patronage .We must not be inspired by how close we are to the leadership in power. We must refuse to be used for leadership preferences if we want to be building a prosperous nation. The Youth of the ANC, DA, COPE ,IFP, should learn from the Collapse of the KANU Youth Movement (Jomo Kenyatta), Tanzania Liberation Movement (Julius Njerere),( Kenneth Kaunda Party), African National Congress (Mandela) in all these organization they collapsed through Party Careerism, Patronage , containment of the Youth Voice. The energy of the Youth was misdirected to serve the elderly in positioning themselves for responsibility in Party. In the congress of the People this is beginning to find its expression in the Youth Movement. If the Youth Organisations allow this tendency to establish itself, any attempt to combat the demon of Patronage will result in factionalism and infighting within the organizations. This will result in the development of Personality Cult in the leadership of these organizations. In the history of many liberation movements the Leadership or a leader will surround himself herself with individuals who do not question his/her authority or style of leadership. In the South African situation you will find Zuma surrounding himself with Malema, Zille with Mazibuko and Blade with Manamela and Mda with Shilowa. All these leaders are used to bark anyone who oppose the above leaders and intimidate any opposition to the leaders above, the potential in this Youth has been reduced to Conference kingpins The leadership becomes paranoid that any member who articulates a different view is seen as the enemy that must be eliminated; suspended or expelled. This group becomes a clique used to threaten dissenting views. Battle for the Soul of the Youth of Political Parties a common illness The Battle to capture the Youth Voice is informed either by the desire to save Political Organisations from the divisive elements or a desire to entrench factionalism within the organizations. The failure by youth formations not to unilaterally focus in building a coherent, militant and Discipline voice of the youth will be a demise of the achievements of the youth in the struggle against apartheid. We need to build a Youth that will be inspired by the service to the Poor and Love for unity and cohesion of the Congress of the People. The Youth of Mda, Malema must avoid a creation of a Youth demagogues, a leadership that starts defining Youth interests from their own personal ambitions. Those who battled for the Soul of the Youth entice young people with no clear consciousness with Jobs, deals and representation in parliament The primary objective of the Youth of South Africa should be to Rally young people behind the vision of the creation of through democratic, on racial, on sexist and prosperous South Africa not behind personalities. The recent reflections by Youth of SA in the media are a clear testimony that the Youth is being coerced to serve the views of certain factions. The lack of critical analyses on challenges Facing South Africa is a reflection of a youth created to manage change not to force change. Through our new orientation it is pivotal that we move quickly in building new ethos and building a new person, a truly fresh Young activist. Nqaba Bhanga Disclaimer Before acting on the contents of this e-mail, the recipient should verify that the originator has the appropriate authority and any person neglecting to obtain such verification will be acting entirely at his/her own risk. Please further note that any confidential, private or privileged information contained in the message is subject to legal privilege. -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] .
