Happy (?) Youth Day Mzanzi (another ramble of mine)

June 16 of the year 1976, was the day thousands of South African youth took to the streets in what is known as the Soweto Uprising, opposing the Bantu legislation, which saw major school subjects being taught in Afrikaans, some in English, and basically banning the subjects being taught in the local languages that the students spoke and understood.

This Uprising resulted in many deaths, but it played an integral part in the fight against the Apartheid regime.

The 16^th of June has become an annual public holiday in South Africa to commemorate the youth and what happened in 1976.

However, since I am part of the youth of South Africa, I, in all honesty, think it would have been better for me to just go to work today, and contribute to the economy of my country rather than sit around and think back on nothing.

 

Our local television channels paid some tribute to the reasoning behind today’s public holiday, and the DJ’s on the local radio stations made mention of the event, but other than that, it seemed that there were celebrations here and there in the form of musical shows and parties, but I did not hear anything being done to continue the struggle towards what those youth of 1976 fought for.

 

South Africa has changed. We are not what we were back then. We have schools where all races can attend, and languages are taught in English and Afrikaans, the local languages are being taught as a subject choice, and there is the individual choice to attend university and move in the direction of many career paths for all.

 

The youth are the majority of South Africa’s population, but it seems that we are totally missing the point of who we are as a nation, and where we are in terms of positive growth.

We have so much power on our side, but it seems to me that most of us just don’t have the vision of our country growing and instead, are focused on individual prosperity only.

 

Our leaders are out there and many are saying that we, as the youth, are not involved enough in the country’s politics, as opposed to the 1976 youth.

I know that I am not the only one of us that believes that our leaders are doing a rotten job out there.

Yes, I may not know exactly what it requires to run this country, but if it were my responsibility and my job, I would be out there, engaging with the future of this country – the youth and next generation – to find out what is missing, what needs to be done, what is wrong, and make the necessary changes and form a united front with the people who matter to make this a stronger nation, not only for today, but for tomorrow, too.

Our leaders choose to bad-mouth one another, make fools of who they are as people and focus on irrelevant things while making a complete laughingstock of themselves in public instead of doing what they should be doing.

Yes, we love to moan and complain about the ‘idiots in power’, but what are we doing about it exactly? We have more in number and we have had more opportunities and exposure to so much more, but we are doing nothing.

I am writing this after I had many doubts in my mind but I decided that I had to write something, because this is important to me, as it should be to all the youth of Mzansi.

We need to write, sing, march, rant and do something about where we are and where we want to be. We need to use our numbers, our education, and our talents - everything we have - and be fearless about it.

 

One of the problems we face as youth in South Africa today is that we are not a united front.

Those youth of 1976 fought for change, the great Mr. Nelson Mandela fought for change- change for what?

It seems we have forgotten that the struggle, the fight, the imprisonment, the deaths and the hardships were all in the name of equality.

Racism might not be as bad as it was, prejudice might not be as bad as it was – back then – but it still exists.

What are we doing?

Why are we smearing the legacy and struggle, behaving as though people never put their lives on the line so that we could have better, so that we could converse with one another in love and respect regardless of colour, creed or language?

Have we as a people become so disrespectful, that we can turn a blind eye to what the people before us lived through, disregarding their struggle?

 

We need to oppose what we don’t agree with.

We need to talk about what we are not ok with. We need to blast it online, on radio- wherever we can.

We need to say that we want what the youth of 1976 died for.

We want English, Afrikaans and isiZulu to be taught from Grade R so that the next generation have no barriers.

We want the powers that be to work towards making tertiary education something more attainable to all because we do not all have funds, due to restrictions of past days, so that opportunities are equal; we need to do away with BEE because it is just another form of inequality.

We want everything that will bring change.

We want a true commemoration for Youth Day 2015- come on! We’ve got a full year to make something happen.