Making decisions: Is this the era of young people in Tanzania?
Kisarawe District Commissioner Nickson Simon is among youth appointed recently to become leaders in various position.
What is becoming apparent in the political and social climate in Tanzania is that there is a wave, a movement, of vehemently passionate youths driving various agendas and being involved in leadership roles, formally and informally. Several incidents epitomize this reverberating sensation across the country.
President Samia Suluhu Hassan recently appointed many officials at regional and district levels in the country – what became popularly known as “mkeka wa rais”, figuratively portraying a laid down mat, decorated with an army of leaders strategically positioned at different points on the mat, ready to execute the country’s motto: “kazi na iendelee”!
What caught the attention of many people is the number of youths appointed in these positions: 28 of the appointees were young persons, 35 years and younger, representing 20 percent of all appointments. This is unprecedented and says something about the direction the country is taking. Perhaps the ‘kesho’ in the popular Swahili statement ‘vijana ndio taifa la kesho’ has finally arrived!
Apart from these formally appointed youths in various leadership positions in the country, other movements of their own, involving young people who may be called ‘leaders without titles’ are driving different agendas shaping the social space in Tanzania.
For example, a buzzing “#KatibaMpya” movement is waged on Twitter by a group of formal and informal youth leaders. This group seems to be steadily establishing a strong foothold on the online space. For example they have several times been able to get various topics trending on Twitter, a feature on the social media platform to show what most people are talking about in different geographical locations.
Another group of equally vehement youths is driving the digital innovation and the broader entrepreneurship climate in the country. Establishment of initiatives such as Silicon Dar, a Community of Innovators, Technology Enthusiasts and Entrepreneurs in Dar es Salaam; the Tanzania Startup Association, are all efforts driven and dominated by youths and playing a significant role in shaping the innovation and entrepreneurship climate in Tanzania. But how are these youths shaping the current and the future of Tanzania?
Young people play an instrumental role in development at country, regional and global levels. Various successful, youth-driven development initiatives are noted across the world as well as purposeful stakeholder driven initiatives to empower young people in the development agenda. Look at the myriad youth leadership programs across the world.
Of course, what is seen now could be the fruits of these various efforts put on developing and preparing youths for leadership that were started decades ago. For example, a steady stream of efforts has been put to increase youth representation in politics, and now across the world the number of youth representation in parliaments is growing. Similar efforts are put in other important matters shaping the world today such as digital transformation, social innovation, climate change, democracy, race and gender, et cetera.
As youth participation in development and leadership increases, and initiatives to empower youth also continue to burgeon, it is a clear indication that the future is even brighter for young people.
However, this is not the time to lift the foot off the pedal for both side of this equation: the youths themselves and the stakeholders of youth empowerment including stakeholders in politics, private sector, development sector, etc. It is rather time to press on, to broaden the reach, to now move beyond the youth in urban and affluent societies to the youth in rural and marginalized areas, to empower and leave no youth behind.
What we are seeing today is a result of efforts that were put yesterday, and what we want to see tomorrow will be a result of the efforts we will continue to put from today. Perhaps it is high time to review Nelson Mandela’s quote that ‘the youth of today are the leaders of tomorrow”, because what is happening now is that “the youth of today are the leaders of today”!
Ms Kimaro writes about careers, leadership, personal development and issues affecting youth and women.
