Kajoloweleka during the Youth Forum
* The MW2063 agenda is youth centric and this is the right way to achieve development
* No country can move forward aside the youths and this needs to be addressed by flipping the script
* From fear to hope; unemployment to employment; poverty to prosperity and conflict to peace
By Leonard Masauli, MANA in Doha Qatar
Executive director for Youth and Society (YAS), Charles Kajoloweka — who is representing Malawi at the least developed countries conference in Doha, Qatar told delegates that time has come for African leaders to harness and leverage youths’ skills in their respective countries in order to achieve meaningful strides towards sustainable development.
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About 46 youths are participating at the summit and during a Youth Forum discussion on Sunday, Kajoloweka said young minds “are at the heart of achieving the MW2063 development blueprint but to achieve that there is need to invest in the youth power so that they become a social capital for development”.
“The MW2063 agenda is youth centric and this is the right way to achieve development,” he said. “No country can move forward aside the youths and this need to be addressed by flipping the script — from fear to hope; unemployment to employment; poverty to prosperity; conflict to peace and this will change the narrative to use their skills for a transformative change.”
Kajoloweka said aside this, Malawi needs to invest more and diversify its economy by focusing on issues of mining in line with the fundamentals of MW2063 — which focuses on urbanisation, commercialisation as well as industrialisation.
He said Malawi, therefore, should cast the net wide and use the LDC conference to expand on partnerships and learn from other countries on how they are doing on their economies, and translate the conference resolutions into actions that will benefit Malawi.
Minister of Information Moses Kunkuyu said the conference gives hope and huge desire for least developed countries to move to being middle-income countries with commitments made by developed countries.
“Malawi is also committed to move towards graduation and exit from the LDC,” he said. “Now that we are exiting from being the chair of LDC, fighting corruption is key towards migrating from the LDCs.
“Malawi is such a country which has stuck on corruption and we cannot keep doing this for ages. It is like pouring resources to a basket that has holes. We must unite to fight against corruption and poverty,” he said.
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The Youth Forum discussed stimulating efforts regarding empowerment issues amid the sufferings from insufficient resources, to combat epidemics and escalating debts, which has led to a decline in developmental progress of their respective countries — which have a total of about 242 million youths.
Meanwhile, President Lazarus Chakwera has urged the LDCs to continue pushing and not to lose focus as they implement the vision of Doha Programme of Action to reach the graduation status.
Speaking on Sunday during the opening of plenary session, Chakwera pointed that delegates to the conference should take advantage of the sideline meetings to enhance bilateral ties and strengthen partnerships that will make this conference a success.
“When we depart from here, we must remain focused and protect the momentum we are building here,” he said. “We simply cannot afford to lose it. We cannot afford to have these high level meetings without any progress made and action, saying the Instabul Programme of Action suffered.”
He added that the greatest progress is always made by those who focus on what they have and how to use it to build something for the betterment of the nations.
Chakwera noted that having UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) was a reminder of better days that lie ahead of LDCs that would assist to remain focused and believe that the donors would respond willingly with the necessary technical and financial support.
He said that the Istanbul Programme Of Action, which spanned from 2011 to 2020, focused on reducing LDCs’ vulnerabilities and addresses new challenges to development — including the effects of the interlinked food, fuel and economic crises and climate change, with a strong focus on structural transformation through increasing productive capacity.
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres (left)
UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres said LDCs are getting stranded amidst rising of crisis uncertainty climate chaos as well as deep global injustices.
“The growing injustices, rising unemployment, ravaging effects of Ukraine war, the pushing of women to sidelines, poverty and poor sanitation, are some of the pressing challenges LDCs are encountering,” he said.
Guterres added that LDCs face interests that are up to eight times higher than developed countries, saying there was need to expand international efforts to fight tax evasion — citing low income countries lose a much higher proportion of their tax revenues to tax abuse.
He pleaded that LDCs needs a revolution of support across the key areas, saying there is need of immediate financial assistance to rescue the SDGs.
Guterres believes that the summit is the centre moment for peace to demonstrate a global commitment for action while urging the developed countries to live up to their commitment to provide LDCs with percentages for gross national income official development finance assistance.—Additional reporting by Lisa Kadango Malango, MANA also in Doha
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