Youth policy advocacy
I have been engaged in youth advocacy work ever since I was a student leader far back in the Teacher Training College. I have tried to sensitize young ones and especially the youth to be assertive and to aspire for better lives through education. As a student leader, I joined and lead groups that sought to empower the youth to promote sustainable development through education in the following areas: Environmental sustainability, higher education and making informed decisions. Now as a worker, I continue to promote the same sustainable development message by encouraging and assisting young people to choose courses and educational institutions according to their abilities and interests since education is the key to sustainable development. I have seen a lot of my mentees go high the academic ladder. I have also seen change in attitude towards the environment by most of my mentees. Others have followed me to chat this path but some of these mentees unfortunately, have fell apart on the way due to peer pressure, financial problems beyond our handle. My key advocacy messages varied based on the group but it mostly included parents, educators, and most especially young people and the youth. --Kafuiaheto 18:38, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
Thanks Kafui Aheto for your contribution. I note you have progressed on your advocacy campaigns...from student days to present as a worker. You have rich experiences that can benefit us. What would you say has worked well and not worked well throughout your experiences? I note that you have provided ongoing support to your mentee's which is very valuable in erms of understanding how far reaching the advocacy message has 'lived'
Hi Everyone,
No I have not engaged in specifically youth policy advocacy work but I have done different kind of advocacy work on gender related issues and other national development related issues. From 2007 to 2009 I worked for a Non Governmental Organization that was in Gender and Development and on many occasions we would advocate on issues related to gender based violence, land issues, the rights of children, gender equality and human rights. We would also work in solidarity with other organization. There were two campaigns I had worked on. The first was a campaign where we were advocating for the constitution of Zambia to be amended through the constituent assembly and not what government was proposing. The campaign was called the ‘Red Card Campaign’. The second was an advocacy campaign was against a Member of Parliament (MP) of a particular constituency had uttered degrading remarks about the use of women in a parliament session. This rose dust and anger in the gender activists
The methodologies during the two campaigns of getting the people involved by advocating with and for them worked well even though government still did what they wanted. The campaigns were well advertised and attended. There was a lot of attendance by the public. The method of confrontation especially over the issue of the MP did not work well our pleas were ignored completely.
One of the advocacies engaged in was targeted at the President, Vice President and the policy makers or should I say the office bearers.
