As many as 80% of ANCYL and YCL members are unemployed.
These young people find themselves joining the two movements because of the dire economic situation and are often misused by elder leaders for their own selfish interests.
Delivering a political report at the Donna-Bella conference centre during its 7th congress, YCL Gert Sibande leader Ayanda Mashaba said the 51% Mpumalanga youth that is reported to be unemployed by Statistics SA find themselves despondent about the future and as a result have turned to crime, gangsterism, drugs and alcohol abuse or “to transactional sexual relationships” in order to counter the poverty they are faced with.
“What’s more, many more turn to our organisations, the ANCYL and YCL as a way of upward economic mobility.
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“Several organisational reports show that more than 80% of ANCYL and YCL members are unemployed, making our organisation de-facto recruitment agencies,” Mashaba said.
“In the quest for economic progress, young people in these organisations are pitted against each other to prove loyalty in order to advance their respective economic interests,” he said.
Those who were more loyal to a particular leader find themselves being liberated economically while others were scared of being principled because they feared they would no longer receive the benefits from leaders.
Others hoped they would get similar benefits, serving the interests of a certain powerful leader than the policies or ideologies of the movement.
“Comrades, this is the better reality of where we find ourselves as an organisation.
“This bears testimony to not only the economic imperative of solving the unemployment crisis but also the political imperative,” he said.
“The inability to solve the crisis of youth unemployment not only undermine economic development of our country but is also a grave threat to the internal cohesion and stability of the ANC and SACP,” he said.
(edited by MLM)
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