05 Jun 2013

Laws and policies are crafted to facilitate service delivery, Minister of Youth Sport and Culture, Mr Shaw Kgathi has said.

He said public officers had a tendency of citing laws and policies as some of the hindrances that affected their work.

Mr Kgathi, who was addressing a kgotla meeting at Otse on June 4, said for a long time, laws and policies had been described as stumbling blocks in offering good service. The minister said this ought not to be, as laws were crafted with an aim of facilitating programmes rollout.

He expressed disappointment that the youth in Otse had not taken advantage of the Youth Development Fund (YDF) despite the high unemployment rate among them. He said this could defeat government’s intention of fighting the unemployment rate, which stood at 17 per cent.

Minister Kgathi advised the youth to ignored people who castigated government programmes, adding that government had devised Youth Empowerment Scheme (YES) to develop their lives. He said YES was a holistic programme geared towards addressing unemployment among youth and building capacity through boot camps, among other things.

Other programmes that the ministry had embarked on to develop the youth, he said, included the Back-to-School initiative and as well as engagement of freelancers for Kutlwano and DailyNews.

Otse youth gave various reasons for failure to utilise the programmes, such as inadequate information on the programmes themselves and lack of timely feedback. One youth, Mr Odirile Fologang said they were putting efforts to take advantage of the programmes but were often told that they were on a waiting list.

However, one of the successful youth entrepreneurs, Mr Molefi Nkwe of Mafia Soul Clothing encouraged the youth to double their efforts. He said they would not make it in business unless they were determined to turn their challenges into opportunities

Member of Parliament for South East South, Mr Odirile Motlhale said although traveling to Ramotswa for services could be a disadvantage, the youth should put more effort to change their lives. ENDS