With the official campaign period open, youths of Karonga South have been urged to attend each party’s campaign rally conducted in their vicinity and listen to every campaign promise from all manifestos for them to make an informed choice on who to vote for in the forthcoming polls slated for May 21.
Malawi Electoral Cycle Support (MECS) project coordinator at Justice and Peace of Karonga diocese Moses Mwakisalu made the call on Saturday at Hangalawe Teacher Development Centre (TDC) during an engagement meeting his organization held with the constituency’s youths.
Mwakisalu said for every voter to make a decision, they must have what every shadow candidate has in store for their constituency or ward, saying the time to vote for a candidate based on party, religious or ethnic affiliations is long gone by.
“Basically, this meeting was organized with the sole reason of reminding these youths that it is imperative to spare time and attend political rallies so that they hear promises their candidates will be making in the run up to the general elections.
“This will help them to vote for development conscious leaders, leaders who have what it takes to uplift the socio economic affairs of every constituent, leaders who have passion for the underprivileged and the youths,” Mwakisalu said.
He further advised them not to stay away from voting as doing so would end up voting for irresponsible and useless leaders indirectly.
Speaking on behalf of youths, a youthful village development committee (VDC) chairman Happy Ndovie hailed the organization for what he said was a timely meeting.
“The meeting has come at the right time when political party campaign meetings are in progress. We will follow each and every candidate to see if they really have policies that would change the youth’s status after May 21.
“And secondly, this meeting has instilled hope to some of us as the current leaders have failed us in terms of development and youths programs. Therefore, this is the right time to go en masse and vote to unseat careless leaders and put in place visionary leadership which can develop our nation,” Ndovie said.
Taking his turn, group village headman Mwakanyemwale took a swipe at some traditional leaders who are demanding and receiving handouts from candidates vying for Parliamentary and Local Government seats, saying such tendencies have potential to put in positions ‘broke’ leaders who end deserting their areas for towns or cities to recover from the financial and material loss incurred during campaign.
JP of Karonga district is implementing MECS project in the lakeshore district of Karonga with funding from UN Women.
