Minister of State in the Ministry of Culture, Youth, Sports and Community Development, Senator Oscar George has proposed four recommendations for consideration to the National Youth Council of Dominica (NYCD) on a way forward for its further success. He was delivering remarks at the NYCD official inauguration ceremony of the 2023-2025 incoming executive.
“Firstly, having a clearly defined purpose and objective sets the tone,” he said. “Young people need to understand both what they are doing and the intended outcomes of their actions.”
George continued, “Therefore providing them with context and clearly defined expectations which will allow for deeper connection to their work.”
Secondly, he stated that the NYCD must exhibit fair and equal representation.
“It needs to represent the interest of young people fairly and avoid marginalization of under-represented youth and importantly it must allow people of different backgrounds to share their ideas and experiences which can lead to new perspectives,” he indicated.
Thirdly, he said the success of the council will depend greatly on how effectively it can encourage active youth participation and create successful partnerships.
“Youth should be involved in the work of the council in a meaningful way,” George stated. “It is important to form partnerships with other organizations to benefit from their experiences.”
Finally, he said the NYCD should be a non-stop shop to promote opportunities that target young people. Furthermore, George said the success of the NYCD will depend on how hard the council works as a team.
“So please I urge you to work together and be your brother’s and sister’s keeper,” he said. He pointed out that in reality, in some countries around the world, the youth don’t have a voice.
“Thank God in Dominica through the NYCD young people have a voice and young people have a say in policy discussions,” George stated. “And what we need to see is that the NYCD becomes a source of information by our policymakers and certainly we at the ministry intend to use the NYCD for advice on all issues.”
He believes as young leaders the NYCD must promote creativity and develop a spirit of adventure to create new opportunities while positively impacting others. George stated however, “These changes will require a fundamental change in the relationship between us and the central government.”
Meantime, he said going forward the goal should be finding ways to get more input from young people in decision-making.
“This will require regular engagement between us and yourselves, this will require regular discussions with youth groups all across Dominica,” George stated. “I think that is important for us, not just [to] do it, but consistently do it.”
He added, “Let’s go out there and meet young [people], let’s go out there and have regular engagements, hear what they have to say, document it and come back to central government and let’s have a discussion and see how much of these things can we input in our policy decisions.”
Unfortunately, nothing will be done. They cannot even fix Goodwill school but they want to be talking about uplifting youth? Youth continue to be disrespected and treated like people who should only shut up when big people conversations are happening. Also, these youth committees are only little social and hook up clubs. nothing gets done of any real significance.
A young man who played cricket for Dominica Junior level, there as Skerrit’s user boy, used by Skerrit to talk crap. A young Dominican all rounder by the name of Kavem Hodge was dropped from a West Indies 13 man squad for the Wednesday day and as a Dominican Haynes and his Bajan selectors didn’t even have the audacity to make him one of the two reserves, yet this moomoo shadow sports minister of Skerrit, like his master Skerrit, couldn’t even express disappointment in the way Desmond Haynes and the rest of the Bajan selectors treated our young brother though he had a tremendous first class year with both bat and ball that far exceeded that of Raymond Riefer, Jermain Blackwood and others on the team
You are expecting a lot from this regime. Haven’t you seen what has become of our sporting facilities under this administration? Can’t you remember who our sports ministers have been under the Skerrit regime?
Can Skerrit even distinguish between a cricket ball and a football?