The South African Youth Commission has accepted as accurate a damning report by a former employee describing the organisation as highly ineffective and lacking policy, measurable objectives and data on youth practices.
”These are some of the weaknesses that we are currently addressing,” commission chairperson Nomi Nkondlo on Wednesday told a Parliamentary committee reviewing the effectiveness, efficiency and appropriateness of state-funded (chapter nine) bodies.
Asked by the ad-hoc committee on review of chapter and associated institutions whether her response could be interpreted as saying the report was accurate, Nkondlo replied: ”Yes.”
While she believed the commission’s role was to lobby government departments and ensure they prioritised youth issues in their programmes, review committee chairperson Kader Asmal disagreed.
Its mandate was much more broader than that, he said.
”Your function is not to simply advise government … you must implement measures and review the policies and practices of government departments,” he said.
Implementing measures in response to challenges such as the addiction of young people to drugs and alcohol should be one of the commission’s core functions, said Asmal.
However, Nkondlo blamed government departments for not prioritising the youth in their programmes.
”Some of the departments refused to cooperate with the commission,” she said, but could not produce any documentation to back her claim.
Despite what appears to be a duplication of functions and a R3-million under-expenditure, the commission needed more money.
Nkondlo said additional funds were still needed to beef up the organisation’s policy and research units.
”We are currently aligning our structure to our mandate, and as a result we needed more money to strengthen our research and policy capacity,” she said.
Asmal, however, questioned the rationale behind setting up a research unit when there were several research institutions in the country.
The Treasury has increased the commission’s R20-million budget by nearly 8%, saying the organisation had indicated it now has additional obligations.
Another area of concern to the committee was the ”youth desks” in government departments.
It emerged that their functions were similar to those of the commission.
”You are located within the Presidency and yet there is another youth desk in the Presidency. Is that not a duplication?” asked Asmal.
Nkondlo told the committee to direct the question to Minister in the Presidency Essop Pahad. — Sapa