Brics Summit urges youth to fight poverty

Young people are urged to use sufficient per capita resources and intellect to address the foremost challenges of unemployment, poverty and inequality.
This was expressed by the Minister in the Presidency responsible for Planning, Monitoring, and Evaluation Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma when she officially opened the 4th BricsYouth Summit at a venue in Bela-Bela on Tuesday. The summit, expected to end yesterday (Wednesday), was held under the theme ‘Radical Economic Transformation – Making the Brics Bank for the Youth’.
Dlamini-Zuma said youth development was at the centre of the country’s future and formed the core of its development agenda. The National Development Plan (NDP) 2030 asserts that no development of any society can happen without its youth, she stated, adding that the plan singled out young people as key to the development of the country. She further reminded that the NDP emphasised that South Africa’s youthful population presents an opportunity to boost economic growth, increase employment and reduce poverty.
Executive Board Chairperson of the National Youth Development Agency, Sifiso Mtsweni reportedly appealed to delegates to leave the summit with a body that will oversee the implementation of the resolutions and any other youth-related resolve taken by the main summit of heads of states. Mtsweni stated that they wanted their counterparts to take from their war cry as the South African youth, ‘nothing about us without us’.
The summit was also addressed by Health MEC Phophi Ramathuba, Director for Youth Development Directorate Donald Selamolela and other delegates.

Story: ENDY SENYATSI
>>endy@observer.co.za