/ 21 March 2007

Young communists call for youth development

Human Rights Day should be used to assess rights accorded to the youth by the democratic government, as well as the acceleration of youth development in the country, the Young Communist League (YCL) said on Wednesday.

”For the working class and the poor youth, Human Rights Day must mean food, free and equal compulsory education, secure and better jobs, access to antiretroviral treatment and a better life,” spokesperson Castro Ngobese said in a statement.

Ngobese said young people were being denied their basic rights to identity documents as entitled by the Constitution.

An example was Kabelo Thibedi, who held a Department of Home Affairs official hostage in Soweto after battling for three years to get an ID book.

The league also paid homage to those who lost their lives in Sharpeville on March 21 1960.

”Their resolute and steadfast commitment to the emancipation of our people from the apartheid tyranny and colonisation of a special type ushered [in] the human rights we now enjoy.”

Ngobese said South Africans should be wary of those seeking to ”erode and steal fundamental rights, especially the minority that benefited immensely in the first decade of freedom while the majority of young people remained poor”.

”That is why the YCL supports the call made by the South African Communist Party that the second decade of freedom must be with and for the workers and the poor.”

He also dedicated the day to the ”struggling” youth in Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Western Sahara, Burma, Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan.

”These struggling youth are being denied their rights to freedom peace and democracy. — Sapa