Africa-Press – Lesotho. The issues addressed in this article turn to be excruciatingly restrictive and impeding to our country’s development economically, socially and politically.
From the view and perspective of a young political activist, Lesotho is quite hypocritical and mediocre as a nation. We are handcuffed by an obsolete political culture, dominated by corruption and lack of patriotism.
The political culture we uphold as a nation keeps dragging us deep into poverty and a wider gap of disparities. A large part of the youth population is more enthusiastic
about entertainment more than public affairs. They also lack practical political will to participate in policy making processes. Older counterparts turn to take advantage of youth political apathy to milk the system dry, which
in turn perpetuates a wider gap of inequality. As a young political scientist who spent years studying the craft of politics, it does not tickle my fancy to see my fellow youth being
vocal about politics on social media. The hypocritical part of this matter is the fact that large scores of the very same youth that is noisy on social media,
are not even registered with the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) in order to take part in the elections. The hypocrisy portrayed by youth in this
country cannot be separated from hypocrisy embedded within the structures of political parties. Constitutionally, political parties entail youth leagues meant
to serve as vehicles through which young people are capacitated with resources to directly address the socio-economic challenges affecting them. However, in
order for plans to be implemented within youth committees, the very same youth committees must be subject to the scrutiny of the National Executive Committee (NEC).
Surely these youth leagues are seen as useless entities serving no purpose due to lack of autonomy. The aim is not to backlash the observation of protocol
within the formation of political entities, no. It is to expose the root causes of lack of political and social progress. There is another fatal political
culture that we continue to uphold as a nation, which is the appointment of unqualified and incapable comrades into technical government vacancies. The
inability to substantively differentiate between political and technocratic posts has raged havoc on our political and economic stature. Our politicians
are capable of appointing individuals without relevant qualifications nor experience in technocratic posts – and these Re positions that require the technical
know-how to administer government processes for quality service delivery purposes. This unholy act is done duly to remunerate and reward loyal comrades
at the expense of the whole nation. Lesotho is heading to the polls in few months, we can go through the manifestos and constitution of all political parties registered
with the IEC, not even one political party has a clear and transparent road map on how jobs will be distributed when political party leadership is given a
chance to govern and control government ministries. Most people join politics with the hope of being incorporated into government posts as their respective
parties win elections. The lack of transparency in the distribution of jobs will forever remain a mystery and, a tool used by politicians to hypnotise the poor and vulnerable masses so they elect them into office. To be continued …
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