Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) party leader Raila Odinga has been drumming up support for inclusion of the Kenyan youth into the government, not only in his current presidential bid for 2022 presidency, but other previous unsuccessful State House races.
According to Odinga, youth are the back born of any country’s economic growth for the young energy and innovative minds they carry.
And as he campaigns for 2022 presidential bid, Odinga has promised to have the youth allocated at least four cabinet positions should he succeed President Uhuru Kenyatta,
He spoke Tuesday in Nairobi during a meeting with a group of youth from the Mt. Kenya region, where he championed for youth empowerment.
Odinga tabled a reminder that when he was Prime Minister he held summits on youth mentorship, adding that this would be part of his policy.
“When I was the prime minister, I had roundtable meetings with the business community and also the youth. The roundtables were being held quarterly so that we can get feedback from the youth on what problems they are facing and what we are doing. It is something I have tried before and will be part of my policy,” said Odinga
“On the issue of cabinet positions for the youth… I can say it will be more than four,” he added.
He pledged to have the youth in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs attending to matters of foreign affairs since a majority of the citizen living outside the country are the youth.
Odinga noted that if the youth are properly empowered, they become a proper source for wealth creation, further stating that this was part of the BBI agenda.
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“If you don’t give them (youth) education and the necessary skills, they become drug unto the society but if properly empowered they become a proper source for wealth creation… and that is why we need to attend properly to this issue of the youth,” said Odinga.
“In the BBI we said very nice things. We wanted to create not just a department but Ministry for Youth Affairs and a national youth commission under that Ministry. That commission was going to ensure what is promised in policy documents is implemented.”
Mr. Odinga noted that with over 70 percent of the country’s population being the youth, it should be the priority of any government to tap on this potential.
“I strongly believe that we need to put into use the youth energy that we have in this country… The youth can be a blessing or a curse depending on how you make use them… up to now the use has been a curse because they have not been given the requisite tools to be able to contribute well to the society,” said the former prime minister.
Odinga had dressed in a youthful manner to depict his ideological alignment with the youth, taking it to his social media account showing the kind of shoes he was brought by a Kenyan youth.
” My shoes were brought to me by two young men called Ali and Hillary.”
He also tweeted; BABA’s house will have many rooms; I have reserved the biggest one for our YOUTH.
Hii si risto. INAWEZEKANA.
He also reminded Kenyans that the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) was to create a youth department and ministry that would follow up and implement promised policies.
He has for a number of times so far, been trying to whip Kenyan youth from the mountain to back his 2022 presidential race.
