If we were to ask young people who the youth leaders of today are, we would most likely come up with names such as African National Congress Youth League president Fikile Mbalula, Young Communist League national secretary Buti Manamela and … well, who else? They are certainly among the loudest voices we hear purporting to speak for the youth of the country, but where are the others?
A further question would concern what it was they were speaking about last night on TV news. Of late, the answer would most likely be Jacob Zuma. But do these youth leaders speak out as vociferously on the battle against HIV/Aids and unemployment, the fight for access to quality education, youthful violence and the protection of community resources against crime? The answer is no.
We ask this with the memory of young voices 30 years ago that came to articulate the struggle of an entire people against oppression. And in the week that the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) released its report on the right to basic education, it needs to be remembered that the trigger for the uprising of young people in Soweto on June 16 1976 and the weeks that followed was the apartheid imposition of Afrikaans as a language of learning.
Very quickly, the revolt against that shackling became a revolt against the apartheid state. But it started from the lived reality of ordinary South Africans — in this case, their desire for education to give them a fair start in life.
So it is sobering to read the SAHRC’s research findings that 42% of rural pupils surveyed struggle to understand their teachers because the language in which they are being taught is not their mother tongue. In this, as in other chillingly numerous instances, the report reminds us how many of the intolerable burdens the youth of 1976 resisted still permeate the daily experiences of young people. This is why, for all that we have travelled very far from the stark inequalities of apartheid, we have to ask why we are not hearing more voices of the young on issues such as education and HIV/Aids. We are not asking youth not to go to movies and bashes or play sport. But the collective and courageous spirit of June 16 surely continues to be celebrated, at least partly because it is still needed.
As Joel Netshitenzhe argues elsewhere in this paper, the actions of young people in 1976 represented a strike at the heart of docility. The point is that there is little for the youth (or others) to be complacent about. Their voices should be listened to in every policy — but they themselves should not leave that responsibility to organisations that might represent their real interests and needs only partially, if at all.
Otherwise 30 years on, we will have very little to remember them for.
Gone with the wind
When the dust settled after the World Cup qualifiers last year, African -soccer observers were united in pessimism. How would the continent fare without Nigeria, Cameroon, Egypt and Senegal, the traditional flagbearers? When countries with no footballing pedigree, such as Angola and Togo, had to face up to the might of Europe, Asia and South America?
The first round of matches in Germany has provided some answers, and, although the on-field performances have not been as bad as some feared, Africa’s status in the competition is already under threat. Four out of five of the African nations lost their opening matches, although, perversely, it was only Tunisia, who earned a point in a draw with Saudi Arabia, who disappointed.
The biggest drubbing of the first week was suffered not by an African nation but by the Ukraine, who topped one of the supposedly tough European qualifying groups and were many pundits’ pick as the potential dark horse of the tournament.
Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana stood toe-to-toe with two of the most powerful soccer nations in the world — Argentina and Italy between them have won five of the previous 17 editions of the World Cup — and emerged with their reputations enhanced, even in defeat.
Togo emerged from their training ground farce (the coach walked out, his replacement walked out, the original coach returned on the morning of the match) to lead South Korea — who reached the semifinals in 2002 — 1-0 before indiscipline led to the dismissal of their captain and a 4-1 defeat.
Angola, whose progress to Germany is described elsewhere in this issue, lost narrowly to their former colonial masters, Portugal, but their mere presence at the tournament should be an inspiration to South Africa in particular.
The mandarins of world football’s governing body, Fifa, are not swayed by sentiment, however. If no African nation progresses to the second round, we are told, it is likely that the continent’s quota for 2010 will be effectively cut to four — with South Africa, as hosts, automatically qualifying. Asia’s economic power demands that the biggest continent get another place — even though only Korea, of their current four representatives, managed a victory in the first round. The European and South American contingents appear to be untouchable, so it is the developing continents who will scrap over this single place at the main table.
As for 2014, when the tournament takes place in South America — well, like Scarlett O’Hara, Fifa will think about that tomorrow.