Parliament hosted a workshop on strategic planning, leadership and institutional development of the Youth Parliamentary Caucus to support the establishment of a youth parliamentary caucus.
The workshop aims to support young parliamentarians in defining the purpose, mandate, structure and functioning of the youth parliamentary caucus as well as strengthen leadership and communication skills.
It also aims to identify priority areas through which the caucus can contribute to greater youth participation and the integration of young people's perspectives into parliamentary work.
Several MPs from the National Assembly shared their opinions regarding the importance of youth participation and representation in Parliament.
“When we are talking about the youth caucus of Parliament, that obviously brings young people together so that we can carry the voices of the young people, irrespective of the political organisations. And the voices are not only in a Namibian context but actually in Africa, in the world as well,” said Swapo Party MP Willem Amutenya.
“What's so encouraging about this youth focus in parliament is that we have the largest representation of youth in parliament since Namibia's independence. And I think it is important that we unilaterally start working together to try and solve the issues that the young people face in our country,” according to IPC MP John-Louw Mouton.
"The youth caucus is quite very important, not only in terms of coordinating efforts to bring about consensus on issues that affect the young people in our country, but also to engage with other parliamentarians as far as the issues of young people are concerned,” noted AR MP Job Amupanda.
“We need to get the youth caucus started so that we have a platform. At the end of the day, the aspirations are where the needs of young people can be discussed and later be translated into laws. So what we are doing now is to set that platform to start it. So that going forth, we then look at how we debate issues and translate them into tangible laws that can make differences in the lives of these young people,” added IPC MP Michael Mwashindange.