Moving Away from Helplessness to Empowerment: What Clinton Said Next

It is a well-known fact that we pick up some of life’s useful advice and developmental tools in the most unusual format and places. For CIYDA we have looked to establish various innovative ways of harnessing all the necessary information and tools to be a successful youth organization in delivering services to the Zimbabwean youths.

For this I was in Sankt Gallen, a Swiss Canton in the German speaking part of East Switzerland about a week or so ago when I had the privilege of sitting in an address by the former President Bill Clinton. The charismatic statesman was at the opening of the Center for Disability and Integration.

For me it was the mere opportunity to seek some form of inspiration from a former president of Mr Clinton’s stature, somewhat a rare opportunity to say the least.

Despite the occasion having an underlying theme of disability, it was the message that I went on to extract out of the theme and what former President Clinton said,

"shift from a system of helplessness to a system of empowerment, and to change the attitudes of society about how we should see the potential of people and how much we need to develop that potential."

It is undoubted that knowledge is power, not just the academic type, but that also of being informed. I argue that this prevents one from falling into that lull of artificial ‘disability’. In my mother tongue Shona they say, “Kusaziva kufa...” or literally translated to, “not knowing is acute to being dead...” Although I know as Zimbabwean youths we haven’t reached that stage of death yet, it is true to say many opportunities are going unclaimed and where they are being taken on, they are not being fully exploited. It is not to say we are not being proactive, but we have grown accustomed to a way of doing things whereby youths sit and watch and contribute minimally from the periphery of society. It had to take a near economic collapse to spur most of us into action.

However, in mitigation, there have been other external factors to the limitations. Both corporate and governmental entities need to step up and work effectively towards remedying this slow walk towards the ‘grave’.

Majority of the youths want to do something with their efforts. If there are no opportunities there can be put in place skills attaining workshops, volunteer opportunities amongst other things, which can be pursued in the meantime. Yes companies are reeling from economic down-turn, and feel engaging in extensive corporate social responsibility or any other activities that don’t bring immediate returns is not worthwhile at the moment. And yes the government is operating on tight budgets in all its ministries. However lets take the positive out of these situations and look upon it as period to take stock of where we have come from and where we need to go. Corporate organizations can engage youths just leaving education and those that have been idle for long. Access what is out there already in terms of talent and opportunities to be natured. When that economic upturn is upon us, we have already a willing and able youth populace to sustain the rebuilding momentum.

This article couldn’t have come at a better time with the current spate of xenophobic attacks on Zimbabweans in South Africa yesterday. Most of those affected are undoubtedly young Zimbabweans who have crossed the border in search of a better life. A better life is not living hand to mouth but seeking sustainable financial security for one and their loved ones. This in itself should be a wakeup call for our influential to harness the very educated youth populace that we have and is sipping out of the country. Lets create opportunities for them to stop the mass exodus. For those that are remaining lets get them actively engaged at various levels of development. After all we don’t want them falling into that lull of artificial disability.

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What is CIYDA
Contemporary Indigenous Youth Development Africa (CIYDA) is a non-profit organisation founded in 2008 and is based in Harare, Zimbabwe. CIYDA is working to develop and empower the youths of Zimbabwe for the benefits of the nation and Africa as a continent through the use of new media, information technology and networking amongst other things. Through these drivers, CIYDA aims to facilitate an information hub and service provision in the areas of Business Start-up, Social & Cultural Integration, Socio-economic Mentoring and Volunteering. Through current globalisation trends and dispersion of Zimbabwean youths, CIYDA currently has a network connection of approximately 500 Zimbabwean youths in many countries amongst them, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, United Kingdom, United States of America, Australia and Canada.