By Motsamai Mokotjo and Kelebone Tšilo
There’s a need to foster dialogue with young around what leadership is and what it entails.
Why do we have conservation with the aforesaid parties? We clearly understand our role of advocacy however we need to engage future leaders as civil society.
Currently Lesotho is grappling with how to manage coalition governments since 2012 yet the founder of Kingdom, King Moshoeshoe I established a coalition administration when he ruled with different kings and amalgamated different tribes to form Basotho nation in the 1800s.
The concept of SeMoshoeshoe (or Moshoeshoeism) places a premium on leadership of democracy and public participation as key prescripts towards fostering an inclusive environment in which the youth will play a role what kind of leadership they want.
Consequently, we are cognisant of the fact that ours is advocacy, however having checks and balances are critical for the kind of Leadership we want.
Esteemed research centre Afrobarometer paints a gloomy picture of Basotho’s perception of corruption and non-accountability which leaves institutions tasked at a disadvantage.
“In Lesotho, popular trust in the police, army and the courts of law dropped sharply between 2014 and 2017…This occurred at a time of upheaval…that led to the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to recommend a wide ranging series of constitutional and institutional reforms,” the civic body notes.
It continues: “Analyses show that that rising perceptions of official corruption have resulted in sharply lower levels of trust in institutions of public order which in turn has negatively impacted citizens’ perceptions of their democracy and increased the likelihood that Basotho may wish to leave the country.
“These findings confirm the damaging effect of corruption on trust and its potential to erode Lesotho’s fledgling democracy, clearly pointing to the need for the government to fight corruption more effectively.”
It is against the aforementioned that our organisation felt the need to not just to leave it to the arms of government alone; Accountability should firstly start with having conversations with future prime ministers, ministers of His Majesty’s government, Members of Parliament and Senators.
When it comes to Accountability, Lesotho’s Parliament has established the Office of the Auditor General, Accountant General, Internal Audits (within different ministries) and Parliament’s Portfolio Committees.
The National Assembly’s Portfolio Committees has been tasked with playing an oversight role and holding the Executive Accountable.
While still exploring Moshoeshoeism, accountability is central. He had his peer in Makoanyane who always kept him in check i.e. accountable.
Another aspect relates to gender issues relating to participation in governance since Lesotho adopted the Proportional Representation (PR) in Parliament and local councils and other affirmative action routes in a bid to have participation of women and other marginalised groups.
It is against such background that we decided via our organisation Youth In Work Give Association we partnered with Gem Institute an Men Engage Lesotho we hosted a workshop on leadership an accountability on July 10, 2021 at Tšenola in Maseru.
Our is also to instil a sense of responsibility and inspire young people to engage in discourse around public issues and achieve our generational mandate of occupying a space in national dialogue.
*Mokotjo and Tšilo are coordinators of Youth In Work to Give Association (YIWGA)
