In a new strategy to get to know the feelings of Kenyan youths towards politics and governance issues generally, CORD Leader Raila Odinga has set aside a day during weekends to catch up with the youths.
The CORD leader is keen to tap into the youth vote and believes, contrary to popular myth that President Uhuru beat him in the youth vote, that he won majority of young peoples support during the 2013 elections.
Raila maintains his government would have offered the best for Kenya’s youths, decrying what many see as President Uhuru’s excess PR but with little hope for the youths in Kenya.
While the jubilee alliance has used both Uwezo funds and Youth Enterprise Development fund to woo the youths, both have not achieved much as the process of acquiring the funds is cumbersome with so much conditionalities attached to it.
The other youth initiative – Huduma Centres – are few and far, only serving a fraction of the urban youth, most of whom are relatives and companions of those in the bureaucracy. Uhuru has been focused to engage in bare knuckle publicity stunts like taking selfies and inviting celebrity youths at State House just to appear youthful and cool.
Odinga, on the other hand, believes that Kenyan youths are getting hard going in the Uhuru regime more than anytime in the last decade. The worst hit are youths with ‘papers’ who come out of colleges only to find the country isn’t creating new jobs, neither is the environment favourable for creating own jobs.
Odinga’s weekend meetings will seek to have candid and open talks with young kenyans as low as form four leavers and fresh graduates before addressing rallies.
Over the weekend, Prof Makau Mutua openly revealed that the ODM leader will be on the ballot in 2017, becoming the first high ranking Odinga advisor to spill the beans.
Odinga intend to use these forums to explain his agenda for youths in the long term, which, according to him, is ‘sustainable’ for a generation born in technology world.
Yesterday, Odinga was seen hosting several youths – male and female – accompanied by his former campaign aide Mr Eliud Owalo and ODM Director of Membership Ms Rosemary Kariuki among others.