Decriminalize the youths and empower them with skills, values, and mindsets for effective youthhood.

I come from a history where elders loved grandchildren. They spoke to the deeper meanings of life through stories at a bonfire.

The relationship between the elders and the youths was full of love, care, empathy, inspiration, exemplariness, and correct guidance.

In those days, youth was gold! They admired youths for their strength, swiftness, passion, and skills. Chinua Achebe in his Things fall apart relays how the elders, then, treated the youth and how the youths behaved-Okonkwo is one of them.

These days, especially in Uganda. Youths are known as rogues, gangsters1, vagabonds, rioters, hooligans, terrorists in short criminals by the elders who have done little or nothing to invest in them…

How can such youths be seen as criminals?

The elders today can afford to slap a traffic officer, beat up an expecting mother, or a two weeks old mother moreover a police officer, abuse fellow elders as swine, idiots, wolves, and still get away with it. But remember, learning is also through imitation. This was not the case in the days of history. such elders would be required to bring a goat or a fowl to cleanse their lips and reconcile.

The elders of then didn’t make empty promises-how would they teach integrity, honesty, and trust to the youths? My Ankole grandpa would promise you a cow and give it to you. This is how youths were raised, trained, and educated-practically. Many elderly leaders today are seasoned artistic liars. I wonder who will teach them values!

In those historical days, the only occasions on which an elder would charge the youths to fight against each other was for entertainment or defense of the land_ ‘Makuyu and Kameno’, flocks, and herds Ngugi Wa’thiongo has these details in his River Between. For entertainment, they never used weapons. Weapons were only used during the war with intruders-enemies.

If an elder commands youths to shoot at fellow youths who are not armed, ask yourself whether it's for fun or defense of the land and flocks. But if we invest our time preparing youths as criminals, without quality education, the right mindset, values, and practical self-sustaining skills let's shoot them as enemies or else we respect life and get to the drawing board. The majority of youths don’t have land or flocks to defend and therefore they need the support and guidance of the elders today to acquire those key things…