50 young Mozambicans in Russia for World Festival of Youth and Students

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50 young Mozambicans in Russia for World Festival of Youth and Students

8:55 CAT | 19 Oct 2017

Titus Juliao Facebook (Courtesy photo)

A delegation composed of 50 young people from all provinces of the country and representing various social extracts is attending the 19th World Youth Festival in Sochi, Russia, Notícias reports today.

This is a worldwide event that brings together 20,000 young people from 150 countries, under the motto “For justice and peace, fighting against imperialism, honouring the past and building the present.” The Mozambican delegation is headed by the president of the National Youth Council, Manuel Formiga, and OJM general secretary Mety Gondola.

According to Edilson Munguambe, a member of the national committee for the preparation of the event, the World Youth Festival, which started on Saturday in Sochi, is a forum for dialogue and debate on the main challenges facing young people particularly in the economic development component, preservation of state sovereignty, security and active participation of this social group in the materialisation of these states.

Culture and globalisation, the global economy, the knowledge economy, the development of public institutions, politics and international security are the topics under discussion.

Edilson Munguambe said that this was a unique opportunity for Mozambican youth, judging by the topics covered for the debate and given the current context of the country, where President Filipe Nyusi has been working for effective peace and national reconciliation.

“The youths participating in the festival have an opportunity to explore experiences from other countries in the world and gather sensibilities on what may be the possible ways to recommend to our government so that we can contribute in this unquestionable effort that the President of the Republic has been carrying out with a view to materialising, as soon as possible, the desideratum of effective peace,” he said.

Youth has, on the other hand, the challenge of inclusive development. According to Munguambe, since Mozambique is an emerging country and several others are present, the young people will have the opportunity to understand the strategies that are being adopted in order to promote an accelerated and, above all, inclusive development that benefits all.

As youth forms the majority of the population of Mozambique, all policies that the government adopts must be effective in order to ensure their inclusion and promote their well-being. However, he said, youth are aware that it is necessary to take a proactive attitude in the process.

Young players for change

“The expectation is that when we return (from), we will make a chain of young people to embrace the efforts of our country, bringing concrete ideas about what we think the country should be in the future. There are 50 young people representing all the provinces of the country here, and not only members of the OJM (Frelimo Youth League),” Edilson Munguambe said.

The Mozambican Youth Organisation (OJM) is a full member of the World Youth Federation, organiser of the Sochi event. Munguambe explained that OJM provided an opportunity for other young people who are not necessarily affiliated with the Frelimo organisation or party, and the young Mozambican delegation included representation from several associations affiliated to the National Youth Council.

Also present at the festival are young people linked to various state and government institutions, young entrepreneurs who, on their own initiative, took an interest in the project and personally assumed the financial burden of participating, and young cultural activists who, according to Munguambe, will promote the image and good name of Mozambique.

Asked if the fight against colonialism was not out of date in the current world context, Munguambe said the one pressing issue that the festival had been emphasising was a new trend of interference in world affairs and agendas contrary to the challenges of modern and emerging states.

“We are talking, for example, about the issue of piracy, fundamentalism, and other manifestations that are contrary to the central objective of the global world, which is balance, harmony, stability, peace and social justice. In a way, this subject is very pertinent, in the sense of studying the causes of the political interference of these movements that, above all, seek to focus on interests that are more capitalist than collective,” he said.

Munguambe noted that the event coincides with the 100th anniversary of the October Revolution in Russia, known as the Bolshevik Revolution, a milestone that changed the model of the Russian administration, where young intellectuals who, tired of the oppressive regime in force at the time, decided to organise themselves and establish a more just state and social harmony.

He argued that it is only youth that can make change and build a society that everyone wants.

Russia has hosted the festival twice, first in 1957, in the time of the former USSR, and then in in 1985 (XII festival). At the 6th World Festival of 1957, which took place in Moscow, the festival gathered the largest number of participants in its entire history.

The aim of the festival is to consolidate world youth around the idea of justice, strengthen international ties and to develop intercultural interaction within the young.

The present, 19th edition is seen as a new stage in international cooperation, bringing together the next generation around the ideals of peace and friendship. The languages of the festival are the six official languages of the United Nations: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish.

Source: Notícias