By OTIENO OTIENO

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Most sub-Saharan African governments have done little to cushion their youth against the aftershocks of the Covid-19 pandemic, a new study has shown.

A review of the recovery plans and policies for Kenya, Rwanda, Nigeria and South Africa from the pandemic by the International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW) found the majority of them have not sufficiently addressed the special needs of people aged between 15 and 35.

This demographic is among the hardest hit by the socioeconomic shocks of the pandemic, including losing their source of income, dropping out of school and becoming more food insecure.

Many are struggling to find decent jobs and others have been lured into crime, the report states.

“Youth lacked opportunities for authentic participation in policy formulation processes, and they additionally felt that their opinions were not sought or valued,” said Erick Yegon, a senior associate director at ICRW, a non-governmental organisation. “They further cited lack of trust on government follow-through regarding their participation or access to recovery resources.”

In 2017, African heads of state, under the auspices of the African Union, made commitments to expand investments in the youth to harness the demographic dividend. More than 65 percent of Africa’s estimated population of 1.4 billion are aged below 35.

The report noted that policies that could benefit youth, such as loans or grants to small or medium enterprises, do not include mechanisms to help them become beneficiaries.

Exceptions

There were a few notable exceptions.

For example, the decision by the Kenyan government to offer free internet, mentor 500 youth entrepreneurs and provide funds to empowerment organisations was singled out as a good actionable inclusion plan in Africa.

Although the youth expressed optimism for the digital future, they said the existing and emerging infrastructure was neither adequate nor responsive to their needs.

Dr Yegon said investments to promote distance learning appear to have benefited those who were already at an advantage, through ownership of smartphones or computers.

The study also noted that donors did not step in to fund the youths. Instead, the majority of the countries relied on foreign aid.

For some countries, poor government decisions only worsened things. Dr Yegon noted the ban on Twitter in Nigeria and growing commercial borrowing for public sector loans.

by many African governments during the pandemic.

The Nigerian government’s decision in June 2021 to ban the use of Twitter in the country has had severe economic costs, particularly for young people and their businesses. A July 2021 report noted that Nigeria lost at least $243 million in less than two months of the ban.

Three-quarters of the Nigerian population of 200 million are younger than 24 years—a generation that is also hyper-connected to social media and rely on online platforms for their business activities.

Increased commercial borrowing, the authors noted, is most likely to eat out the future of the youths on the continent.

Questions are being raised not only on how governments will pay their newly accumulated debts, but whether their leaders are compromising the future ability of their young people to flourish.

Generally, experts on public debt agree that the accumulation of debts has the potential to handcuff these governments’ capacity to create employment opportunities, respond to emergencies, and support programs that offer long-term gains across sectors.

And with the recovery from the pandemic being premised on access to Covid-19 pandemic, the study noted that the youths and the other hard-to-reach populations have not been prioritised in inoculation exercise.

Moreover, the ongoing lack of vaccines to the young population will negatively affect their ability to conduct income-generating activities.

However, Dr Yegon reckons that the gaps in planning for the youth also provide an opportunity for more active focus on youth inclusion in the design of recovery measures.