Friday, November 6, 2009

Youth program by government and political parties

Why is there lack of programs and activities organized by major malay political parties to encourage Malay youth in volunteerism

In Malaysia youth between 14 to 19 years old, the breakdown by ethnic groups is as follows:
Malay 1.5 million 60 %
Chinese 512 thousand 20 %
Indian 171 thousand 7 %
Non-Malay bumiputras – 334 thousands 13 %
Total 2.5 million

Youth development in the country come under the purview of Ministry of Youth and Sports. Several programs were introduced by the Ministry of Youth and Sport such as Rakan Muda , PLKN , other clubs and societies etc. There are also many NGOs involved in youth activities. However these activities only involved youths and not teenagers. In Malaysia youths are those whose age from 15 to 40 years. This is the only country in the world where one age 40 is considered youth. As a result these teenagers were neglected and were not provide proper guidance by the government agencies.
Because there was no proper guidance, these teenagers get involved in undesirable activities such as loitering, drugs abuse, absence from schools, illegal motor race and many others. Because of these they were not exposed to social work. They became not interested when people asked them to join voluntary group. The government agencies failed to have effective program for our youth to participate in good social activity.
It is the same with Malay political parties. They have youth section, but all the activities are for politics only. They concentrate mostly with those above 21. It is because these youths will give votes. The teenagers were not their concerned. They failed to understand that these youths are future voters and leaders too.
NGOs in the country also are very much like political parties. Teenagers are left out with no program for them.
Schools are where these teenagers study. However schools concentrate more on academics. Co-curriculum activities are not compulsory. Its only useful for those who want to further study in local IPTAs. For average students since it is not compulsory they prefer to concentrate on study so that they can get better results. School principal like to see high percentage of passes. They don’t care if the teenagers their other potentials are not explored. Because of these, teenagers also become individualistic. They don’t care about others. How would they love doing volunteer work.
So here the government, political parties, ngos have to look at these weaknesses. Please draw up program for social works for teenagers in future.

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