It is on the premise that the younger generation has nothing good to offer that the elder generation keeps the youth out of the processes of policy formulation and other important aspects of governance in today’s democratic reality. No doubt, this is the direction in which the opinion of some youths and most of the elders run. Some youths hold it that the elder generation takes us to be young and foolish. And as a reaction to this, these youths rail back at the elder generation, calling them old and bereft of ideas, senile, selfish and so on. So the salvoes shoot, the elder generation pitted against the younger.
On this score, I will not join issues. I shall not dear to pit my tiny might in battle for or against any of the contending parties. I would rather stir the middle course; for as a wise man said, ‘the middle course can get the best of both worlds’. It seems to me best to stay the path of treading with caution. For there is much we could learn from the elder generation and at the same time, we would need the energy and the verve of youth to bring the ideas and wisdom of age to bear on individual and national development; for if wisdom comes with age only, then the youth lacks it and if strength and vigour wanes with age, then the elder generation can only boast a modicum of it. This is the typical symbiosis which characterizes most developed nations in contemporary times and in the antiquity; the brain and the brawn. It is requisite for a society that aspires to the heights of development to have a think-tank to marshal out blue-prints for societal development and the brawn, which could be the political-will, to undertake the execution of the blue-print.
We should take cognizance of the cords of mutualism that bind our two generations and also be very careful to not rupture them as we indulge in this unhealthy contention.
While I believe with the elder generation in the saying that a child who washes his hands properly will feed from the same plate as elders and in the Bible dictum that a man who is diligent in his work shall stand before Kings and Queens and not mere men, I also hold it to be true that it is the elder that would teach the child how most properly to wash his/her hands.
Children have very impressionable minds. They pick up attitudes and approaches to life which they see in others. Economic realities and societal conditions also contribute to shaping their orientation to life. This is a confirmation of the position held by John Locke that the human mind is a tabula rasa. For this same reason, the Christian Bible clearly admonishes that parents should train up children how they should grow. As youth, we are influenced in very several ways by peers, and our leaders. In fact, at every stage of development, the elder generation has a very critical role to play in the psychological orientation of a child/youth. And even if the child were recalcitrant, the best option would be to continue with our parental and elderly admonitions and not to give-up on that youth/child.
This role of the elder generation extends into the affairs of governance. The youth wants to see a certain clear headedness in policy formulation. They want to see a certain sincerity of purpose in the approach of our leaders to certain very important issues of national development. They want to see a clear demonstration of singleness of purpose in the thrusts for nation building. These actions on the part of the leaders of thought and opinion would serve a very essential role in teaching us youths how to properly wash our hands. These will serve to effect a values re-orientation in the youths; the National Orientation Agency has a lot to do in this regard. Institutions for citizenship training and leadership skills inculcation in the youths should be established. With the youth properly grilled in the art of leadership and management, the elder generation should not express reservation and objection to trying out youth in those spheres of governance which require energy and enthusiasm. These institutions would teach us to ‘look at the things that deformed us yesterday, that are deforming us today’. They would also teach us to ‘look also at things which formed us yesterday, that will creatively form us into a new breed of men and women who will not be afraid to link hands with children from other lands on the basis of an unashamed immersion in the struggle against those things that dwarf us’. The tribal and religious mistrust which has plagued us must be curbed entirely; those dwarfing tendencies of religious fundamentalism and terrorist sabotage must be confronted head-on and eradicated. These are but a few of the many issues that retard our national development which these institutions would help us to curb.
On our part as youths, we must be totally committed to a values re-orientation and we must begin to exhibit a quality of followership to our leaders of will, thought, and opinion. It does no advantage and no benefit whatsoever to launch vitriol and platforms of abuse and disrespect for our leaders. Wherever went all the African qualities of loyalty and respect for elders? They probably have been relegated to the background of historical antiquity with the progressive invasion of Western culture and ideas. Almost all the institutions which the elder generation bequeathed to us we have succeeded in bastardizing. We have proved very inefficient in their management. We are completely given to material gains and selfish interests. Maybe ours is a manifestation of the global trend of falling standards of excellence and judgement.
Our style of politics as youths reeks of mediocrity; our very strong attachments to tribal and parochial sentiments are tell-tale signs of the wide divorce from the very sublime ideals of our national heroes. We exhaust ourselves pursuing shadows and trivialities. It is little wonder we are called young and foolish.
Is it not foolery to call our leaders all manner of insulting names and level accusations on them which we cannot substantiate? Is it not foolery to be pessimistic about one’s own things, one’s country? Unfortunately, this is the attitude of most youths today.