WSU ACADEMICS ON RETHINKING JUNE 16 COMEMORATIONS

Government Communication and Information System in partnership with Walter Sisulu University conducted a Youth Empowerment Seminar at Emalahleni Municipality, Lady Frere to commemorate youth month.

The seminar gathered 50 young entrepreneurs and scholars from all the wards of the municipality as a means to deter youth from criminal activity through entrepreneurship..

The guest speakers of the event were WSU Senior lecturer in Social Sciences, Dr Nelly Sharpley who spoke on academia alongside, Dr Thobekani Lose who shared on entrepreneurship. Both speakers are from WSU.

Sharpley, said, “We need to be the youth that understands the times. There is formal and informal education, they are all spaces of learning, one cannot say that they cannot learn in South Africa.”

Sharpley further explained that education facilitates what people know about themselves and how they can move on to exercise their obligations and rights.

“Academia is a community concerned with the pursuit of research and education. It’s also a conscious decision process and determination of inward awareness and external awareness, which means being aware of stakeholders and role-players in achieving your goal,” said Sharpley.

Sharpley further stressed out that there is  population that is economically active, but the abnormality is the fact that there is a youthful population that is not an economically active population.

“The dependency ratio on government is very high. You have the elderly people who are supposed to be dependent and the young ones who are supposed to be dependent, however, there are also active bodies who are supposed to be productive and active in economy whom are also dependent on government. This becomes very heavy on government to carry, so we need to change the game,” said Sharpley.

Sharpley shared that growing up in the villages everything is decided for you. You are told to go to school, pursue this course and you do it without knowing why you have to do it and that needs to be changed. She advised that the youth needs to plan the future before reaching the post school stage because everyone has a personal journey and identity so youth needs to decide accordingly.

“We need to realise the things that are happening around and plan on how to facilitate a better engagement as the youthful population of South Africa because right now we should be talking about the country gaining when it comes to demographic dividend,” concluded Sharpley.

Centre for Entrepreneurship Rapid Incubator Manager and Researcher , Dr Thobekani Lose, said, “Our education does not favour entrepreneurship, all what the youth thinks about after finishing school is employment, we need to change that mentality because jobs are scarce.”

Lose further explained that besides making money, entrepreneurship solves community challenges, an entrepreneur sees challenges as opportunities and think of ways to provide solutions and that also assists in solving unemployment issues in the community.

“I am a big fan of wisdom, which is the application of what you know, without applying knowledge you can never go far. The youth needs to be willing to work on their own and not rely on government for opportunities otherwise will be frustrated and stuck, get started and see how far you can go.”

Lose concluded by saying the youth of today possesses a lot of skills that they can use to make a living, that entrepreneurship is not studying entrepreneurship at school and think that you are an entrepreneur, but it is about taking action, realising your skills and making good use of them.

• Anita Roji