Kwame Asiemoah Jr is the Volta regional NDC Youth Organizer
Sam Jonah's speech "Down the Up Escalator - Reflections on Ghana's future by a Senior citizen Sam K. Jonah" offers great insight into the complexities of the challenges young people of today and future generation are bound to encounter due to the lack of compassion from our "fathers and mothers", especially those of them who were tasked to create a descent life for us - their "children."
I am not naive about the lack of vision of some Ghanaian leaders, but I always live with the hope that lessons will be learnt from the past to shape the present for a brighter future.
However, it appears currently that our elders are not learning those lessons, resulting in the current retrogression we are seeing as a society, instead of progression.
Our current situation is as though Kwame Nkrumah's fight for independence meant nothing. Our leaders today are quick to seek out new colonial masters to give them our natural resources in exchange for pocket money.
The average Ghanaian Youth is not lazy. Ghanaian youths are ambitious and driven by the desire to break the chains of poverty. We want to provide for ourselves and our families. We don’t want to live in a society of miseducated people. We don’t want people to be homeless or hungry. We are sick from the filthy gutters and pothole-ridden roads. We want to do better.
However, our major challenge is directionless and visionless leadership. If our role models are sub-standard, you should not be surprised if we too are not par excellence.
My fellow Youth, how do we proceed from here? History tells us that until the youths of a country are willing to play an active role in changing the status quo, their lives will continue to rotate in the vicious cycle of hopelessness and retrogression. It is time for the Ghanaian youth to speak up, take action and lead the charge against injustice, foreign invasion, lack of accountability and transparency, and failed leadership. My dear brothers and sisters, we need to seek new ways of doing things and demand nothing but the best from our public figures, including anybody in the position of trust, like teachers, doctors, judges etc. Those who can speak, should speak up; those who can work, should take their work seriously; those who can lead, should get involved and lead us to a new future. It is time to stop applauding mediocrity and demand for inclusive excellence.
There is work to be done. Youth of Ghana arise for mother Ghana cries for help.
With the right spirit and attitude, we shall prevail and make Ghana prosperous and clean without losing our soul and communal spirit.
Our situation is dire, but there is hope if we can rise up for positive change!
