Elders gang up to rescue Nairobi Youth

BY JOSPHAT SIROR

The youths in vast estate have often been linked with activities of terror gangs, but elders’ banks on their ‘old age’ wisdom to weed out criminal activities

After more than a decade of neglect from political leadership and lack of employment opportunities, many youths groping in the wings of uncertain future in vast Eastleigh Estate in Nairobi are exploring new options that could make them earn a daily bread.

The youths who have always being a subject of ‘underworld’ deals are undergoing a transformation makeover through philanthropic activities in their lives that would eventually land them long-term entrepreneurship under the initiatives mooted by none other than the aging class in the society.

The elders who have persistently expressed worry over the soaring number of school drop outs and unemployed youths loitering in the Estate say that the solution is to integrate them into a community-based work to avoid the idleness that could potentially lure them into the hands criminal gangs.

“Our main objective is to change the lives of many youths sitting idle by integrating them to community work in Eastleigh estate,” said Hassan Guleid, an elder and a businessman in Eastleigh.

The initiative is informed by booming business and the possibility of the idle youth being targeted for recruitment by criminal gangs in Eastleigh.

Potential threats

The elders saw the urgent need to arrest the situation before it spirals out of hand due to potential threats posed by increasing number of jobless youths by encouraging them to identify viable projects.

The youth totalling to over 4,000 between the ages of 17 to 22 have joined community-based groups to reap from the

ambitious programs that are administered by Eastleigh Business Association.

The initiatives ranging from garbage collection, car wash, taxi business to ubiquitous football discipline have been lined up to benefit the idle youth groups that have been wallowing in abject poverty.

According to Abdikadir Salat, a teenage victim of persistent clashes in Northern Kenya there has been an air of relief following the introduction of the new opportunities that recognizes the usually neglected youth segment.

More youths, Salat says are now positioning themselves to benefit from the new initiatives in Eastleigh. The young Salat was among the thousands of teenagers whose parents were affected by the fighting in the swathes of Northern Kenya .

But even as he contemplated the next step in his life before joining the youth group, his colleagues were at the weekend busy playing in an inaugural football tournament held at Eastleigh PCEA grounds.

Football tournament

The youths from different spheres were included in various teams that totalled 10 overall in a four-day intensive tournament.

The youth groups, 32 in number are involved in various ventures that sustain their stay in the city as well as safeguarding them from criminal-related activities that has also attracted majority to the football as part of extra-curricula sport.

Far from the field is a group of youth armed with shoves and wheelbarrows.

The youth are participating in newly started environmental clean up project in one of the fields that have in the past been littered with heaps of waste in Eastleigh ’s

Moi Airbase, about 5 miles away from the city centre.

With the efforts of the youth groups formed already mounts of raw waste have been cleared away from the estate.

“This has been enabled by the efforts by the youths who have joined hands to participate in community work,” said George Omondi, one of youth leaders in Eastleigh.

International experts

Also the elders intend to engage local and international experts to impart the youth with entrepreneurial skills.

“We are considering the majority retired expertise in countries like Canada where economy and youth employment is far higher than in Kenya.

Our goal in the near-future is to make use of this group (retired experts) to come and impart their expertise and knowledge to these trouble-ridden unemployed youths in

Eastleigh,” said Amhed Sheikh Abdullahi, the Associations' Secretary and an elder in Eastleigh.

The more than tens of a youth left out of the government’s recently launched Kazi Kwa Vijana schemes in the area are set to benefit from the elders’ initiatives.

“We are also out to encourage the youth particularly in this area of Eastleigh to actively participate in the new structures of governance and representation that has been brought forth by the new constitutional dispensation,” says Mr Guleid.