Simon Mesfun, Jul 29, 2010

The youth are tomorrow’s leaders and decision makers. So, obviously, they have to be guided properly and grow up in a good approach. One of the means to make the youth productive is the media outlet. The past as well as the present proved mass media to be the main tool to produce outstanding and competitive youth. Understanding this logic, the National Union of Eritrean Youths and Students made the issue of media and youth part of an international symposium it conducted from 21 – 23 of July, 2010 at Hotel Asmara Palace in the capital.

The issue was presented in a form of panel discussion. The panel which was conducted in the second day of the symposium was interesting and took different angles to enrich the issue of youth empowerment through mass media. There were four panelists: Justin Cusava, Vice President of the World Federation Democratic Youth; Mr. Fishaye Tecle, a lecturer at the Department of Journalist and Mass Communication at the college of Arts and Social Science; Ms. Sophia Tesfamariam, an Eritrean writer and activist who resides in the US and Saba Sbhatu from the NUEYS. And moderator was Mr. Elias Amare, senior member of the Peace Building Center in the Horn of Africa (PCHA) which is situated in Asmara.

In his presentation Mr. Justin Cusava said that media outlets should serve the whole population of a nation without discrimination and not one tribe or one group only. It has to work hard to create patriotism among nations and among the societies of a specific nation.

He also indicated that the media in Africa have to fight against imperialism which is today the main tool of the west for their neo-colonization in the continent. “There is great need for imperialist agendas to get denounced. The youth must be protected from the invasion of the west and the government must play a leading role in the national media. There should be limitation in all media in all nations, if not it will go in favor of the developed countries. The media must be owned and controlled by the nationals, and they can produce productive youth through the media. In a safe way, the youth can also participate in the media,” he explained.

The next panelist, Mr. Fishaye, raised three issues to look over the approaches of media organizations towards the youth; the media that youth prefer to use, level of access that the youth has to the media and how the youth use the available media.

The first issue was to indicate that the public must take initiative that can make the youth participate in the media outlets. The second issue has some close connection with the first and it was to recognize the level of access of the youth in the rural as well as in the urban areas. One can not expect the rural youth to have the same level of access and exposure as their counterparts in the urban areas. So, the society is expected to exert some effort in order to minimize the gap and make those in the urban area their role to raise the level of access of the youth in the rural areas. Similarly, the third issue was to look whether the youth with some or higher level of access to the media is making a difference or not.

Sofia Tesfamariam is a well known activist and she contributes a number of articles mainly regarding political condition in Eritrea to the national media and other websites. Her point of discussion was regarding how the alternative media should respond to the mainstream western media in the developed countries with regards to youth empowerment. Ms. Sophia pointed out that there are a number of alternative media outlets like Aljazeera and Press TV. But these media can not bring a significant outcome in a short time and they don’t have uniform coverage in the rural and urban areas. “We have a number of alternative media outlets but it is up to us to identify the alternative media,” she pointed out.

While talking about youth empowerment Sophia said that it is about self respect, professional development and similar values. “For me youth empowerment is like the achievements of the members of the Warsay-Yikealo development campaign are acquiring,” she stressed.

She then went on saying that media is everything and covers everything the society (especially in the West) conducts in daily lives. The western media are influencing the societies through various methods – the movies, music, radio stations, TV channels, magazines newspapers and other related mediums. The alternative media has huge responsible to respond to the huge and powerful media of the west. There are thousands of magazines, thousands of daily newspapers, thousands of radio stations, thousands of TV stations, thousands of book publications and so on. They are telling the people what to eat, when to eat, how to eat, which doctor to visit and are dictating other private issues. These thousands of mass media are owned by a few people with the same objective: to strengthen the western countries’ agenda.

As Ms. Sophia said, the alternative media would not come from any where, but us. Those who have access to the above mentioned and other alternative media outlets have to translate the content to the local languages and make the youth aware of the developments in the world. Cooperation among those who have the access and those who do not have it is the key factor in this issue. Those who have access can play as gate keepers and provide those who do not have all the important messages.

The fourth panelist, Saba Sebhatu, also raised some points regarding the access to media outlets. “The effort the Eritrean youth exert to overcome some limited access is motivating. The internet subscribers are increasing from time to time,” she explained.

She also talked about the role of media (mainly the internet) and the generation gap. In her presentation, she noted that the new inventions especially in computer related sciences are nowadays by young people. As an example, she explained how a 23 year old college student established today’s most used social networking website, Face Book.

The panelists also answered questions from the participants regarding the issue, role of mass media in youth empowerment.


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