ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa has called on young people in the governing party to rebuild and revive the moribund youth league, and urged league members to “rise from ashes”.
Ramaphosa was addressing the Peter Mokaba memorial lecture in Polokwane on Friday.
“You must not become paper branches that exist on social media where you only hurl insults at each other and attack each other. That must come to an end. You must build branches that speak to the issues of young people,” said Ramaphosa.
The memorial lecture started two hours late amid security concerns and possible Covid-19 violations at the Jack Botes Hall in Polokwane, Limpopo.
The side event formed part of the build up to the party’s 110 birthday celebrations to be held on Saturday.
Ramaphosa added that he believes the youth league can still be revived.
After having long been a breeding ground for future party officials, ministers and presidents, the ANC Youth League has been a shadow of its former self since the ousting of its charismatic leader Julius Malema in 2011.
“I am so pleased to see you in such numbers because it tell me that the spirit of the youth league is still in your chests, the spirit of the youth league is still alive, and today as we celebrate the life of Peter Mokaba. It basically means that there is hope for our youth league,” said Ramaphosa.
“Let’s revive our youth league, let’s have real branches of the youth league. As we move to the conference let’s choose leaders who are going to put the interest of young people ahead of all others.”
Ramaphosa the party must do everything to ensure that the youth league must never go back to the situation that it has been in the past few years.
“It has been an embarrassment as we were going into the election without the youth league,” said Ramaphosa.
Ramaphosa added that the ANCYL must create branches that speak to issues affecting young people.
“This is a challenge to you comrades, particularly as you rebuild branches of the ANC. Your branches shouldn’t be paper branches that only release media statements on newspapers or social media or on the radios insulting each other, let them be branches of the ANC that speak to the issues of young people,” said Ramaphosa.
“We must have real branches of the ANCYL. I want to be able to know and say our youth league is up from the ashes, it is the youth league that Peter Mokaba used to lead.”
The ANC president said youth unemployment remains the biggest barrier in the fight against poverty, adding that government was not folding its arms.
“It’s not like we are sitting and doing nothing about the plight of young people, we know that we need to do more but initiatives are under way,” he said.
“We have created the presidential stimulus package and in the course of time it created employment opportunities for more than 500,000 young people and also set up an employment youth service that will create employment opportunities and jobs — but we need to do more because youth unemployment still persists.”
- Inside Politics
