Dear Editor,
Allow me space to post this on your interesting blog.
Guy Kawasaki, founder of AllTop once said “Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard.” This is what probably what “we” unemployed UNZA graduates suffer from.
Yes I am a graduate too (graduated one of the top of my class even) and unemployed, class of 2014. I know the adversities of the graduate, especially if you are ambitious and as such I will try as much as possible to be objective in this analysis.
To begin with, Stella M Sata, there is a lot sense in what this lady is saying. Formal employment is not always the answer, we need to think outside the box and realize that government can only go so far in as provision of employment is concerned. Job creation is not the role of government alone, companies must work with the state and labour unions to boost employment and reduce inequality.
The problem of rising inequality cannot simply be placed at the door of government, regardless of how you might feel about the general performance of government.
However, the stark reality is that inequality will remain high until we campaign together for job creation. Without addressing inequality, the economy can get trapped in a cycle of weak investment, sluggish growth and increased social tension. Entrepreneurship is the engine of economic growth and development.
Youth entrepreneurship has a greater potential to aid the achievement of Millennium Development Goal 8, target 16 which aims at providing decent and productive work for youth. Provision of employment among the youth will save us from social exclusion.
Government needs to create an enabling environment for job creation that will help us the young people to have gainful employment either formal employment or entrepreneurial activities. By entrepreneurial activities here we mean proper businesses as opposed to the suggestions of this highly opinionated young lady who I believe does not have an idea of what it means to suffer for an education. Say what you may Stella you have always had it better than the average Zambian.
You studied in the best schools (Malaysia) at the expense of our parent’s taxes, doors opened for you because of your name….and still they continue to open.
You do not know the feeling of having to constantly drop applications, get no feedback, or to be rejected because of lack of experience, everything has been handed to you on a silver platter, and thus you have the audacity to stand and tell the graduate who suffered 4-5 years cramming to go and sell tomatoes. What worries me even more is that this individual thinks she has the monopoly of wisdom and always has anything to say about everything..eish!!! Sometimes silence is golden.
It is better to be thought a fool than speak and remove all doubt. In Zambia, almost 75 per cent of the country’s population of 14 million people is below the age of 35 years, 45 per cent of the population is aged 14 years and below, 20.8 per cent between 15-24 years, 25 per cent between 15-35 years.
According to the 2008 Labour Force Survey (LFS), 28 per cent of the economically active youth were unemployed – almost double the national average of 15 per cent.
Compounded by the large number of underemployed youth and the high number of youth entering the labor market, current estimates show that over 300,000 young people enter the labor market each year. As traditional job-for-life career paths become rare, youth entrepreneurship is regarded as an additional way of integrating youth into the labor market and overcoming poverty. Entrepreneurship and self-employment can be a source of new jobs and economic dynamism and can improve youth livelihoods and economic independence in developing countries. There are many constraints that youth entrepreneurs face in their endeavors. As young people we are more likely to face greater barriers than older age cohorts due to limited resources, life and work experience.
Through support programmes such as access to credit, business incubators, entrepreneurship education and business training, mentorship programs and market linkages youth can acquire the needed capacities and assets that increase our chances of starting and operating our own businesses. We face problems of access to resources such as capital; more young people start their enterprises with lower levels of initial capital; more enterprises owned by young people have a lower market value or inventory; more youth entrepreneurs are engaged in a narrower range of activities; more young people tend to operate from homes or streets (lack of access to space); more young people do not bring experience and contacts to the business, and; more enterprises owned by youth tend to rely on simple tools or have no equipment at all. There is a lot that government can do to help overcome some of these challenges.
But away from that, fellow youths let us desist from being used as tools to propagate the selfish agendas of some of these politicians.
They do not have our best interest at heart most of the times, they just want to use us as tools to further their agenda, whatever they pay us will probably be finished in a week and we go back to the streets.
And VINCENT CHAILE, stop misleading your fellow youths, how can you be marching that you are unemployed yet you drive, and own some shops in UNZA (allocated to yourself during your tenure as UNZASU President)?? story izibika!….its high time you started doing something sensible, you spent 9 years at UNZA studying a Degree that only takes 4 years, we found you there and still graduated and left you, now you are a graduate but every day you are in UNZA, please allow you friends to learn too… move on!
Fellow YOUTHS LET US NOT BE USED, John .F. Kennedy once said ‘Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country’.
Leonard Mangani Zulu, BA.UNZA.
UNZA Graduates – The Tomatoes and Onion Debate added by on
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Viva UNZA vibe. Abash Stella Sata
9 years ,the fool could have been a medical doctor.He is dull just like HH
Another hatemail.Get a life dude!
VINCENT CHAILE,I KNOW THIS GUY,HE WAS VERY DULL HENCE SPENT 9 YEARS AT UNZA FOR A DEGREE,SHAME ON HIM TOMBA WISHI CHIKALA.
THIS YOUNG MAN USE TO BOAST ALOT THOSE DAYS.SEE NOW THAT THE WORLD IS LAUGHING AT U? GUYS PLEASE LET US NOT BE USED BY SELFISH POLITICIANS WHO DO NOT HAVE OUR INTEREST,WE CAN DO SOMETHING
GOVT ALONE CANT CREATE JOBS FOR US ALL GRADUATES,WE ARE EQUIPPED WITH ADDITIONAL SKILLS
It is true stella has all what she wnts cant compare herself to ordinary zambian.In as far as she can suggest that we have to bear in mind that some have not even little to start with it pains me to see a unza graduate just moving up and down in the street.this makes others with small brains think of not going to school because no benefit at the end
Stella should go to hell,she has never suffered before ,so she should just keep quite, I can’t blame her ,no wonder she couldn’t cry for his father,but was in studio rehessing for songs to sing,shame on u,tym will catch up with u,let her come in rural areas Nd see how people ar suffering becoz of this wagefreez,palasiti kutitwa ponta.
Stella you are right. people think that its automatically to get a job once u graduate, education is just a bonus to success. and it depends wiyh the program that you have graduated on
Its take it or leave it to what Stella said. Keep on waitting for umufungufungu. Go to India or Nigeria see for yourself
Do universities prepare and teach their students how to employ themselves? Part of the offside is the University curricular
Its only NEW EDUCATED ZAMBIA who can give you proper advice on this. Our school system does not prepare pipo to stand on their own.its a 9-5
Pipo are only taught to sell time. The one who sells tomatoe has the potential given a chance to do well in life compared to the one who spends lots of time on books and years in exile just preparing himself to sell his/ her time to someone else.
Look at these two Pipo
a) is selling tomatoe on the street
b) is waiting on the street trying to sell his time
In business, whether you have a degree or not, learn to start small bafikala. Even though they have taught you this mu risk management, you are just to dull to master this concept. Just becoz you got your ‘google’ degree u are shy to do something that pipo will laugh at you. What this lady meant if you read between her legs/lines is that she was making an emphasy ba idiots.
Listen to their arguements:
“Did I spend 4 years cramming to come & sell tomatoes? ”
Atabane!! OK, leave tomatoes alone!
GO AHEAD! PLEASE YOURSELVES!!
You actually spent 4 years (exposed 9years) to come & wear stupid cardboards looking for employment at a place full of self-made men & women.
Some University brains especially at UNZA and CBU can be so dull, not all graduate today has a good IQ…leakages and bribery can now get someone into university without good results…we all know this…it is just yesterday when these leakage aided i!diots were paraded endorsing the Skeleton ECL for Presidency…Face it you fools and eat his teeth…Vinyo vanu!!!
Just vote in the UPND a party that has the capacity and knowledge to implement many of the views you have raised. We will stimulate employment through Setting up a business development for start up business and capitalisation of existing ones for all Zambians wishing to enter business.Working with business to promote raw material processing with particular emphasis on increasing Zambian exports through regional and international trade to support growth objectives. As a consequence, Government shall provide market access enable businesses to exploit regional and other international trade opportunities.Improving Zambia’s business climate to promote private and public investments for growth
Let us face the truth. We all know that there are some truths in what Stella is saying. The up roar is not because of what she has said but because of the family she comes from but she did not choose to be born in the Sata Family. Iam not privileged as she is but Iam not going to throw to the dustbin what she has said just because she is connected by birth to the corridors of power.
sure
I have always told you that Zambians are lazy. Ask kashimba chimbwili what happened to the money given loaned to the youth under the youth empowerment programme. The fools blew up themoney in women and luxuries . What kind of government will tolerate this nonsense? Unfortunately this was an opportunity for the Chimbwilis to steal from the same money. So untill you entrust resources with sensible people youths will always cry foul and continue suffering. Wake up Zambians and vote RIGHT !!
Ba idiot cool down & chill for an acceptable flow. Y ukutalika, uyu stay satafye is right,U can start anything & b somebody. At the same tym government shud b supportive of such ideas. We ve peasant farmers who r producing & transportation has bin a problem. Let the government lead !
rubish
but eee this shows how dum most graduant parambaret in the streats waiting 4 mana. naba fumbata ne fesush, shalow headed.
Stella is right. The arab spring was started by a young graduate selling tomatoes.
Did you know that you need K 8 900 to sell tomato at the market as follows:
>Rentals – 2 rooms in compound x 2 months = K 2 000
>Bedding [ bed, blankets, etc] = K 2 100
>Food x 2 months = K 1 600
>Bus fares [ to and from markets] = K 800
> Water and electricity = K 600
>Market stall fees = K 400
>Working capital [tomatoes] K 1 000
>Contingencies K 400
Total K 8 900 QED!
How does a fresh graduate finance this cost?
ask stella who is very naive in her approach and looks at things as if she has never been to higher education in her life. She thinks yapping without actually putting herself in people’s shoes and carring out the economic feasibility studies of her wild dreams, is a good way to sell herself as a politician kiki. Wisdom indeed is a rare attribute
Stellar is right,I second those saying,government must take alead,they could have a point somehow,but look pipo,the point is,we have to start from somewhere,I know most arguments are coming from UPND clueless Cadres,simply,ask your Hero (HH) he states it publicly that he started by KUYEMBELA NGOMBE,worse of all for him to go to school,with no shoes,one book if not with nothing,until he won scholarship to UNZA,what ever happened there after,todate HH says I saved the little money I made,I never went to dance,I. Never went to HAWAII,(if I can borrow his words)he always say this @ his rallies he saved and stated a small KANTEMBA.(PTO)
Nower days what do we see,student gets paid tuma allowances ninshi chalila!we see this in night club’s,in my days. We had this October AIRPORT,not sure if its still existing,posh cars in and out,so even those on attachments what ever they get ends up in this plastic life @ UNZA,some do not even further their studies cause of this behavior,on attachment they are not called back,hence roaming in the streets,@Iam a unza graduate kanshi tumizango eto bakwata we know this,its from school!If only one Can strip off that plastic life(impostor)cause @ the end of the day life itself is real out their.so ask HH, that’s why he did economics, he used to hide sugar under his clothes, Starve himself just to save for that rain day.
I think my English is very simple,simply,I want even a upnd grade seven failure to read and understand,gudnite am on a trp this morning.DENKETE ya katahya basa !!!!
@son of a gun walasa. abaice pa unza balipena kuci fank. google has simplified studies and students spend a good chunk of time partying. the education that i know must revolutionised ones heart and mind to contribute substantially to the dev of our country. Alas, most graduates wait to be employed. even thoz that are lack to access a little capital they blow it up within a flash of a second as if they have a direct link to the mint. Ati ba graduate!!!!!! Shaaaa!!!!!!
@son of a gun walasa. abaice pa unza balipena kuci fank. google has simplified studies and students spend a good chunk of time partying. the education that i know must revolutionise ones heart and mind to contribute substantially to the dev of our country. Alas, most graduates wait to be employed. even thoz that are lack to access a little capital they blow it up within a flash of a second as if they have a direct link to the mint. Ati ba graduate!!!!!! Shaaaa!!!!!!
Dear young Lady please note that we are a poor country even if I have skills there is nothing one can do without the support.We are many on the streets with skills. You may be blessed but tell us what you are doing please tell so that we may learn from you.
data monko
First blame the Government for not providing and enabling environment and resources for the youth to be self sustainable. |After doing this then condemn the youths for not attaining their dreams despite the Government’s efforts. That is how things work baba.
Now look at your fifth paragraph. You still come back to the Govt.
“Government needs to create an enabling environment for job creation that will help us the young people to have gainful employment either formal employment or entrepreneurial activities.”
Hi guys am a new here i like your comments…
about the topic.well our schools for real teach us to be employees rather than employers. i can give one good example of laziness. when grade 12s finish school they spend there time saying am waiting for the results and later am waiting to go to college meanwhile someone is using and expensive smartphone or even has a laptop.. why not sell the laptop and smartphone and buy a ka blue berry. and use the other money to buy barbing machine and establish a barbershop while waiting to go to college or while waiting to be employed. just my idea on many youths who spend time doing nothing yet they are always on facebook, tweeter etc.
Five star you very wise teach these useless graduates. They do not know even to write a letter.
@five star alot have come on this site as usual from the defunct zwd. Two days later they start insulting everyone and boast that they are smarter than all of us.
Lazy graduates ,do something . You wil die waiting to be employed. Foolish.
WELL ARTUCULATED YOUNG MAN. THE GOV’T NEEDS TO COME UP WITH PROJECTS TO HELP GRADUATES TO GET ONTO THEIR FEET AND START TO WALK.THE SITUATION IS BAD. IAM AN ENGINEER FROM UNZA WORKING BUT I UNDERSTAND THIS SITUATION.
STELLA HAS NEVER SEEN POVERTY, SHE RETERALLY HEARS ABOUT IT BUT SHE HAS NEVER EXPERIENCED IT. SHE DOES NOT UNDERSTAND IT.
HER DAD TASTED POVERTY; NOT HER.
GUYS FORGIVE HER.
This is wat fool can do. My fellow youths hear this in bemba they say that kula umone so how do u expect some one to feed u well u are grown. Again they say umwana ushenda atasha nina ukunaya, its like wat we just want someone provide for us. To tell u the truth no one will bring u this employments to you not even so called HH so find something to do before its tolet
It’s so strange that governments in the west(UK, USA, Germany, France etc) strive to make the economic climate conducive for job creation whilst in Africa, young people are expected to create their own jobs. Are young people being trained in useless professions and if so, who’s responsibility is it to make sure the courses being offered by colleges/universities matches the job market or requirements? What’s the government’s role in job creation in Africa ? Surely , not every youth in Zambia needs to be a trader
While I also support job creation by govt . I also do consider that if we are as brainy as we boast; we can as well create our own companies using our reasoning not just waiting. In fact great business people started with their thoughts . Not waiting for some one else to think for them . Your level of education has already exposed you to a lot of ideas which can help you create a job . If you go in the streets what you find will blow your mind ; how most of those who are thriving in business, ask what they started with. Some of them had nil education compared to you . Just see how innovative they are in their little knowledge , they sell sweats ,push ifi balla which they manufactured themselves and do many other ventures to make a living . Just imagine if they had the chance of acquiring your level of academia