BY WATIPASO MZUNGU JNR,
With the passing of the 2009/10 national budget, George Malema, 27, of Malema village, Traditional Authority Kyungu in Karonga is upbeat; looking forward to a day when government will start disbursing loans in the Youth Enterprise Development Fund.
Prior to the May 19 general elections, President Bingu wa Mutharika promised that, if given another mandate to govern for the next five, his government would provide loans to the youth so that they can set up their own small and medium scale enterprises.
Among other things, Mutharika conceived this fund to address the challenges of youth unemployment by providing the youth with knowledge, essential skills, and opportunity to engage in entrepreneurships as a self-employment mechanism.
This came against a background that youth participation in economic development initiatives continues to be impeded by a number of challenges which include limited access to post-primary and secondary vocational training, limited access to credit and inadequate employment opportunities, among others.
According to Mutharika, the focus of the fund is on building capacity, especially in artisan skills and entrepreneurship to ensure sustainability of the business ventures that would be set up by the youth through the fund.
The fund is also expected to provide youth with information on the existence of potential markets both locally and internationally and assist in accessing those markets.
“By investing in our youth, we will afford them an opportunity to focus their energies into productive activities and thereby improving their living standards,” said Ken Kandodo Banda when he presented the then proposed K3 billion Youth Enterprise Development Fund to the National Assembly.
It is against this background that since the passing of the 2009/10 national budget Malema, a school leaver currently doing nothing at home, has never missed daily newspapers and news bulletins on radios to have information on when the relevant department will call for applications for eligible beneficiaries of the Fund.
He is among many other young people across the country who solely depend on their frail and old parents for almost everything in life from a bath clothes to bath soap.
“Since I finished my secondary education, I have never been employed. I, therefore, look at this loan facility as a vehicle to take me to a promised land,” said Malema.
“I am growing up and very soon I will be getting married. I cannot keep on relying parents. Once I access this loan, I intend to venture into commercial farming though on small scale,” he added.
High unemployment rates and HIV/AIDS epidemic, young people, especially girls, are increasingly heading households. As a result, they miss out on gaining proper skills that qualify them to get a job or engage in businesses that would enable them meet basic requirements.
The two challenges have made many girls vulnerable. In some instances, girls have become victims of sexual abuse in their pursuit to provide for the families they are heading after the death of their parents.
Lucia Phiri, 23, comes from Mchinji but now resident in Lilongwe earning a living through an illegal business. Phiri is a mother to two whose fathers she cannot trace was forced into commercial sex work and bargirl at Area 36 after the death of her father.
A man who played a ‘Good Samaritan’ offered to support her with basic needs. Unfortunately, besides providing her with needs he also provided her with pregnancy, which he denied responsibility.
Phiri could not meet the needs of her twins. The only readily available solution to her predicament was commercial sex work, so she thought.
“This in not an easy job [sex work]. You need to entertain every man who comes your way even if you are tired. But you have to do it if you need money,” explained Lucia in an interview. But she revealed that some men do not honour their bills after the act.
In Karonga, however, life is different. Unlike in Lilongwe, commercial sex workers have started transacting on credit; men can now pay at the end of the month.
No wonder chiefs from the district fear there will be an increased number of orphans and vulnerable children.
Possibly, Mutharika had in his colour dream such vulnerable groups when he conceived Youth Enterprise Development Fund.
But Phiri does not believe authorities entrusted with responsibility to disburse the fund will consider her application. She is not ‘connected’.
“Ma loan a m’Malawi amayendera ma connection. Amapeza mwai ndi okhawo odziwika,” said Phiri.
“There have been loan facilities before whose target was poor people. But beneficiaries to such facilities seem to be only those with connections to the authorities or relations to the same,” she emphasized.
Centre for Human Rights and Rehabilitation (CHRR) executive director, Undule Mwakasungula, supported Phiri’s arguments, saying loan facilities in Malawi have proved to be campaign tools for the ruling parties.
Mwakasungula said unless government leaves the Fund to independent people, overzealous politicians are likely to abuse it for them to win the hearts of 2014 voters.
“I would suggest that government should come up with an independent committee comprising faith leaders, civil society organizations and development partners to administer the loan disbursement of the fund.
Otherwise it will be the same song where deserving beneficiaries are made to believe they will access the loan only to be told the programme had come to an end,” he said.
“This is a very important initiative for economically empowering the jobless youth. But there is need for government to exercise high level of transparency and accountability if the fund is to yield the desired results,” Mwakasungula added.
End
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