Delroy ChuckTHE MISSION of every generation is amongst other things to live well, create prosperity and enjoy the good life. As the baton passes, each generation hopes to pass on a solid foundation of economic success, a better social order and an unforgettable legacy of accomplishments on which the next generation of young people can hope to build a great, even a good, society.
In 1962, this generation inherited a country with so much potential, so many dreams, most of which remain unrealised. On any assessment, we have not laid a good foundation for our children and future generations. Our children and their children will have to work hard, very hard, to correct the mess and chaos into which we have brought this blessed land. Indeed, if our young people are the repositories of the nation's future, and of the greatness of a future age, we now have a duty to rescue them from the present mess and prepare them to take over the mantle of leadership and management of the nation's affairs. Yet, everywhere, our young people are frustrated, deprived and simply hopeless. So many of our children graduate barely literate and numerate. And even those who graduate with a certificate and good grades are being stymied by a decaying social order and a collapsing economy.
What prospects now exist for our young people to carve out a decent career and be assured of a happy future? I contend that we are not making much progress, at least in our ability to create the needed jobs and opportunities and to open up more choices and options for our young people. In the sixties, when young people like myself were on the verge of leaving high school, if we had five or more O' levels we would be assured of a job in the many banks, department stores or manufacturing entities. In the early seventies, with a university degree, the choices and opportunities to work in the private or public sectors were simply enormous. The eighties opened rich opportunities for diverse and fulfilling activities and at the end of that period, hope sprung eternal, as Jamaica stood on the verge of an economic take-off.
MID-NINETIES TO NOW
From the middle nineties to now, our young people have known nothing but hopelessness. Nowadays, with the best high school diploma or top university degree, a graduate is not assured of a job, any job. It is simply shameful that so many of our young people after many years of study and acquisition of useful skills and knowledge cannot find employment here. Is it any wonder that the latest World Bank Report estimates that over 80 per cent of our tertiary graduates actually migrate? Many of our best and brightest are lost to greener and more hopeful pastures, when if the opportunities existed here they could make meaningful contributions to build a better Jamaica. And I do not support the argument that their migration is a good thing, as they will send back needed remittances.
Jamaica needs the creative and thinking power of our bright young people in whom we have invested so much and from whom so much is expected.
For those who think we are on the right path, they should walk along the gully banks in our inner cities and see how hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens live and barely survive from day to day. Drive through any inner city lane, at any time of the day, and one will see hundreds of young men occupying the corner, idle, hungry, angry, frustrated and hopeless. Inside the shacks that occupy the gully banks, we will find the old people, sick and helpless, and the unemployed young women in various states of pregnancy or caring young babies.
The present gang violence in Spanish Town is unforgivable but it is a measure of our social decay, the struggle within the ghetto, the rottenness of our inner cities, and of the frustration of our young people. Today, it is Spanish Town, yesterday it was Canterbury or Mountain View tomorrow, May Pen or Grants Pen or so many of the other similar pockets of poverty that may erupt, unless we act fast. Quite simply, we need to find ways and means to put more idle hands and minds to good use. Our young people need jobs, occupations and hope for a better tomorrow it is the only sure way we can rescue them and prepare to hand over to the next generation.
Delroy Chuck is an attorney-at-law and Opposition Member of Parliament.
