Presidential Youth Indaba

The Presidential Youth Indaba on Jobs and Skills was hosted by the Department of Economic Development from the 28^th Feb – 3^rd March 2014 at the Birchwood Conference Centre, youth from all 9 provinces were invited to attend the event which was the first of its kind.

Topics included panel discussions on the Youth Employment Accord, Internships, Green economy, Rural Development and Youth, Education, Skills and decent work amongst others. The programme featured video clips on the governments national infrastructure plan. Panellists included the likes of Sidumo Dlamini – President of COSATU, Yishen Pillay- Chairperson- NYDA, Minister Ebrahim Patel (Economic Development) and Professor Adam Habib- Vice Chancellor of Wits University.

The Indaba allowed youth to interact with key players in industry through Q&A sessions and to hold government accountable for the unacceptable rate of youth unemployment. The indaba was well co- ordinated and the four day programme was packed with really important issues and ran more or less smoothly with the only hiccup being the registration and check in of guests which was a tedious experience however the staff at the Birchwood Conference Centre were professional and very friendly.

Unfortunately we were treated to a lot of ‘going to’ , ‘planning to’ and ‘thinking about’ by speakers and panellists regarding the work necessary to  change the employment landscape for young South Africans and some may suggest the experience was a frivolous exercise due to the fact that besides 12 month learnership programmes to which one delegate commented “Young people end up being learnership specialists.” And Public employment schemes that Minister Nxesi described as “defensive measures against poverty” and which he exclaimed will be upscaled saying “ We would like to see more permanent part- time work.”- confusing- government showed no evidence of a solid plan that will be implemented to change the current situation the country’s youth find themselves in.

The Indaba was closed off by an address by the President of the Republic, which many young people looked forward to, unfortunately a Q&A session was not included in his portion of the programme.