Many of us are illiterate graduates, we are skilled but insensitive to others’ feelings, some of us are successful but very few among us are polite, helping hand, and service-oriented.
Zaheer Udin Babar Junejo
Pakistan is the fifth largest young country in the world. Around 63 percent of the population of the country comprises youth aged between 15 and 33 (UN Population Fund Report 2017). Such a large young population has posed daunting challenges to the social, economic, and political sectors of the state. The fast-rising youth bulge of Pakistan seems to be a constantly ticking time bomb instead of a demographic dividend, threatening its very own existence. Poor youth engagement in non-productive political, educational, economic, and socio-cultural activities indicates the ineffectiveness of the public and private sectors policies, especially at the state level.
The stories we are bound to listen, are not so encouraging nowadays, while you switch on your TV or log on to your Social Media links the only thing which comes at first is anarchy and disfranchised society. Considering the recent incidents where the mob decided the fate of others, it’s easy to conclude that our direction is totally opposite. We at least are not on the path where societies develop and lead.
We, unfortunately, have lost our cultural identity as well as our religious teaching. We need to review our parenting system, instead of being inclusive of why we are marching towards exclusiveness. The second thing which we need to review is our education system. We were taught that education is to socialize individuals, but it also seems that they only are creating mobs instead of graduating humans with values and principles.
Many of us are illiterate graduates, we are skilled but insensitive to others’ feelings, some of us are successful but very few among us are polite, helping hand, and service-oriented. Instead of blaming others, it’s time to first understand and explore the self.
Identifying and making policies that effectively counter the drag of aging on global growth is imperative for the long haul. It’s the time when our leaders need to create the circumstances in which our youth, inherent motivation, the natural commitment, and drive that most citizens have been freed and channeled toward achievable goals. That approach requires an entirely different managerial mindset, which unfortunately we are not ready for.
We should now realize that the power of our vision will motivate others to follow, the passion of our delivery will make others remain accountable. It’s the only way to enthusiastically march off in the right direction.
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Zaheer Udin Babar Junejo is a Hyderabad-based Development Consultant
