Monrovia — Former Montserrado County senatorial aspirant, Bernard Dj Blue Benson, says authorities must begin to take charge of the development of the country’s youth.
“Our young people need attention too,” said Dj. Blue when he spoke over the weekend during the graduation ceremony of the George E. Simmonds High School on the airfield.
The school graduated 42 students which successfully passed the WASCCE exams with flying colors.
Blue, who has embarked on a social media campaign aptly titled #LiberianYouthMatters, said the country needs a vision-based approach to harness its collective willpower in order to produce optimal results.
“There are limited jobs and opportunities for you to earn a living—the cost of living is simply unaffordable,” he mentioned.
Blue said facilities such as theaters, multi-purpose gymnasium, e-libraries, laboratories, modern arena are cardinal to the development of the young people of the country.
“The lack of proper after school activities have resulted to most of the young people adopting alternative habits which involves drugs, sex and other illicit habits. If this goes unnoticed, our country is headed to destruction.”
He further challenged the graduates to pursue the task of acquiring higher education, saying after 172 years of independence, Liberia is only experiencing theoretical freedom.
“I say theoretical freedom because Liberia is not yet free from hunger, corruption, illiteracy, poor educational infrastructures, poverty, and economic growth,” he added.
“It’s a shame that a country like our age cannot boast of the basic educational facility like public libraries and laboratories but yet expect our students to perform magically at public exams when they do not have the least access to these facilities.”
He furthered that acquiring education in a third world country is laden with many challenges. “With poor electricity, poor seating space, poor ventilation, underpaid and tired teachers, and sometimes unbearable environmental conditions—you still saw value in your education!”
Blue, who received over 25k votes in the senatorial by-elections, warned the audience not to elect “visionless representatives and senators who have no plans to redeem the restless youth of this nation.”
“You must desist from electing people who only called on youth during election time. You must desist from electing people who have no deliverables to show for youthful developmental initiatives.”
“It is from this backdrop the Blue Foundation, an NGO set up by me and my supporters have embarked on the project of constructing and activating Liberia’s first modern e-library available to all citizens, especially the students of Liberia.”
He hoped that it would pave the way for further erections of one in every district of Montserrado County.