A Season Of Seven Years

There are so many lessons that old fogies like us can learn from our youth. As the recently revived, restored, revitalized Anguilla National Youth Council (ANYC) arms itself with the knowledge and skills required for representing the youth of this country, they deserve the strongest assistance and support from the various sectors of Anguillian society.

In thinking about this article I was tempted to add the word resurrected to the list of ‘r’s above but as I dig into the history of the Council, one fact has emerged with clarity and it is that the Council never quite died. Even at its lowest ebb, there was always a remnant, a shadow of a process, a few persons willing to participate at national, regional and international fora in spite of the constraints on their ability to perform the representative function. In the seven years since an initiative made by the Anguilla National Trust’s project to promote civil society participation in democracy there have been Committees, Interim Committees, Steering Committees, new Steering Committees and the emergence of a core group of young people bearing the brunt of whatever the effort but with serious dents in the representative function. Some of these persons are a little older youth now, but they were still around to pass whatever was left of the baton last year when a fully fledged, and all female executive committee was elected to head this ANYC.

I was privileged to spend last weekend in retreat with the leadership of this umbrella organization and feel very confident that with adequate public support, the ANYC will again mobilise its youth constituency to become an influential force in Anguilla’s development. They are developing what I perceive to be a realistic and feasible strategic plan that calls for partnerships and other types of relationships with a range of stakeholders already identified. They are astute in recognizing the leadership that exists even among the rivaling youths engaging in violent behaviours and in recognizing that important conversations take place among those young people whose meeting places are street corners and under the trees. They want to address the marginalization of any young person who seems left out of the development equation right now and want to engage with outreach programmes that will enable them to build relationships with young people in these informal groups. They appreciate that youth are critical stakeholders in their own development and when they call upon you to share their Vision, Mission, Values, Strategic Objectives, Activities and Indicators that the Objectives are being met, we must find the time for engagement, the money and other resources needed to finance the wholistic work of youth development. We must create the opportunities for specialized education and training. We must provide the institutional support, the discounted rates for goods and services provided to them, the credit facilities to finance their entrepreneurial ideas, the opportunities for them to have fun and respite from what is already an arduous task. In short we must find every means possible of supporting their work and the Anguilla Great House must be thanked for its generous contribution to the retreat.
At this stage it would be most appropriate to recognize the institutional support provided by the still fledgling Department of Youth and Culture. It is heartening to note that it is being staffed albeit slowly and its newest member of staff, Deputy Director, Ms. Linda Lake, has had to hit the ground running. Kudos to Director of Youth and Culture, Mr. Joash Proctor, and to Youth Programme Officer, Ms. Hyacinth Augustine, for providing the necessary guidance and support, while recognizing the actual and potential capabilities of the young adults entrusted with the tasks of youth leadership. Front office staff Ms. Tamara Richardson must also be recognised. It is a pity she could not be there to make her input of poetry during the session on Sunday when, somehow, Dr. Banks’ presentation brought out the poets in the midst and Tamara has just had one of her poems published in a regional youth newsletter. The Vision of the ANYC indicates its aspirations for autonomy and the Department understands its rolel in assisting the council to stand on its own two feet and then play a different role, as a major public sector stakeholder. The Ministry of Social Development must also be commended in its search for community facilities and spaces that can be utilized by young people who need alternative outlets for creative and positive self-expression. We must not, however, see such facilities as a panacea as they will remain under-utilized if time is not spent building relationships with those young people who remain outside of society’s veneer of respectability, perhaps seeing it for what it is.

Many challenges have been identified and not least of these is the stark gender imbalance in the composition of the ANYC Executive. I have mixed feelings about this because it seems to be reinforcing the old sexist realities of where there is work there are women and where there is money there are men. My charge to the Executive is to create those mechanisms to facilitate male involvement and integrate male perspectives very quickly and the outreach effort must target and reach a cross-section of young men. What I know from involvement with young people across the spectrum of Anguillian society is that every single one of them has something to offer and something to gain. You know a young man who needs to become involved so encourage him and enable him to be able to make his contribution.

There are other societal issues about which we are sensitive. The word xenophobia keeps cropping up and keeps on being deleted but some of the living experiences of those not born here are telling. Those of us who were ‘born here’ find that we are having to make unanticipated adaptations to living on the rock and we are not always as quick to acknowledge the contributions of those who ‘come here’ as we are to name their countries of origin when something goes wrong. One look at the young ladies who comprise the Council’s Executive and their understudies will reveal Caribbean connections that belie the claims about Anguilla’s xenophobia. The debate must be had, the issues raised, addressed and resolved where possible as neither insularity nor intolerance are effective vehicles for youth and sustainable development. No matter where we come from and no matter our levels of material resources, moral support and a personal commitment of time for youth are important forms of investment in this enterprise. Reach out to any group you know in your community, whether they meet in the church hall or under the trees and if they are not yet members of the Anguilla National Youth Council, find out how they feel about youth having a voice and an active role to play in Anguilla’s development and about how they would like their interests to be represented. These are young adults who must be respected as players not in the future but right now. Our paternalistic, patronizing, authoritarian behaviours of old will simply be another indicator of collective readiness for extinction.