For example, 80 percent of the population is under the age of 35. 00. And they all trying to sort out the futures from education to careers and maybe even political ambitions. But is that government actually doing enough to when power is massive young generation . My colleague heated kamani went to free town to find out more in a st debate with the youth. Hello and welcome to the 77 percent. Were here at the prince of will school in free town. The capital of sterile yawn. And in this country, 8 out of every 10 people is under the age of 35. I had to look that number up again because its unbelievable. 80 percent of the population are within the 7 to 7 percent. But the question we want to ask today is, is the government doing enough to not just empower this youth, but also make them competitive globally . Who better to answer that question for me than in some thoroughly unions. And i want to begin with harder because youve had the opportunity to not to study abroad, but also have an on to price here. So perhaps you can give me based on your experience. Do you think that the youth in this country have been enabled or empowered enough to basically be part of the Global Community . They are only well as of a few months ago. There were only 3 disciplines in sierra leone when you go to high school. So theres the arts, the commercial and science, and based on my grades, when i saw the becca examination, which is the examination you take before you go to high school, i had a good grade. So i ended up in a science because every smart person is supposed to be a doctor. And most of the things where were taught in school, were not really practical. It was all theory. I learned about animals in your system, so i never got to see it and everything i, lance was basically just theoretical. And i really struggle with this when i got a scholarship to study in norway, in 2015. I to classes like chemistry and biology and in all the experiments which were very practical, i was really struggling and my grades were not reflecting on the Education System that i received in sierra leone was really smart here. And i went there, i realized i was just not exposed to this form of learning. Lets ask the innovator whos actually standing right next to you mohammed. So youre one of the people whos not just creating employment, but also creating solutions for the use case earlier. So tell us briefly what you do and if what 100 saying is receptive of your experience. Yes. So oh, for me here in civilian for the for want to not as clear. We young people ah, are willing to solve problems and take our initiatives to the next stage. But one thing that is also missing is the fact that we dont have the eco system. We are weak drive and then succeed for my own initiative. Ive been able to empowered over through only a young people in my defend initiative, wish to engage initiatives on part of our 20 communities using wished to energy. Sometimes we wish we are stuck in it. We as we out, we have ideas and then lucy, does this ideas have potential to really grew . Are we from even the community that weve started . Its but its talk because there are no supports really um skill up to the next stage and he was secure funding. Okay, 44. We get to the challenges. Let me, let me go to he is daniel, because were talking about some of the impediments that come about, particularly after graduating the university. And i know finances was one of the key ones for you. Is it normal or is it a normal occurrence for young people yet to stop there, tertiary education, because they simply know, but there is no school fees. Um i got malcolm in 2016 whether there is no support financially for me to follow medication. So i decided to move with m santo wishes to follow telecommunication as a serious injury for me just to support medication. And i was working off of the buses. They also put, i think theres no with, and theres no Parliament Like one. It is an innovator and i was move i said with this is very good. I said, i need to walk mom it to push this initiative and its very good. Its emp army and i was open to do engineering range. I city. Well, theyre just a pleasure. Is that of miss . Its enough to support my mother. Okay. All right, so let me speak to doctor coming here for a 2nd because she is the director of research if im not mistaken, of for delivery and delivery in the ministry of finance. So it sounds to me like, you know, the government has a Great Initiative in place, which is free primary education rather Free Education for all. But then after that, what next . Thats what were hearing. Theyre left to their own devices. Do you think thats true from where youre standing . The thing is yes. For years weve been focused on traditional education. Thats the reality. But now we transition in unseen the awareness and how people approach technical Vocational Training and the need for him to be know, sheep and how he doesnt need to be just one second or you half in one calling to serve. You can serve in multiple ways. You can be a doctor and still be an entre printer. You can be an entropy no and an advocate. So having that platform or crating, those systems in which of them are these, they thought and ideas, know they lobby and create set is just that we need to scale up and find ways to accelerate the creation of those spaces. Yes, government has v m freak m Quality Education Program for per m primaries m primary junior 2nd yesenia secondary school. But then its how we form linkages with other sectors and other players that also jiving changing these spaces. We have those and just working towards m and power in girls, those working towards, im even driving entrepreneurship and its is how we can accelerate efforts to bring all of this together. And i put this problem in a systematic way, so not working in silos, then we can be able to leap from all right. Let me ask, had you because you talked about free and also quality education. You spoke earlier about the differences in how education is passed down. Do you think that the quality of education, what is being taught the back here is enough. Oh is it one thing i am personally not the free kind of person . And thats my personal opinion, because you dont think education should be faithful. Shell be accessible and affordable for everyone. Because when its free right now, only to poor people can send your kids to like goldman school. I want it to be a, and i want to be, i want to be involved in sierra leone, where the local trader and minister can send your kids to the same school because they can afford it. So you have to put the systems in place for people taking his children to school. I was part of the for Education System. When i was in secondary school, my school fees were 60000 leons, i got it every was reimbursed me for 45000 loans. But my textbooks were up to a 1000000 and that my parents found hard to, you know, afoot and i feel like with education is not just tuition is so much more involved. And these are the things i didnt have access to, especially as somebody who was in secondary school. And i was privileged enough because i had access to all these textbooks and stuff which made me really smart student. But then there were or kids who couldnt afford it. That mohammed said like, sorry, then, like daniel said he, he couldnt get to college. And honestly it, its sad because he was smart and he is still smart. But how many of daniels are out there . How many of daniels dont have the privilege to be on tv . I know daniels. I have lived with daniels. I have gone to school with daniels. I come from a community of daniels. Okay. Now, earlier we also talked about access. Lets also focus on the danielles. The girls via and the women in this community, do you think theyve equal opportunities for them within the context of thoroughly on . If im dreaming him and using my feminist demand imagination and been optimistic, i will say we can compete. We have access, but the reality is we cant, we dont have access. Ive been in a situation where at the age of 16, i got pregnant and i mean, i school. And the next thoughts in my head was if im not going to go through school with this pregnancy, im going to kill myself. Thats because for years, pregnant girls were not given the permission to go to school and became was julie bola outbreak when over 14000 girls became pregnant and all of them were kicked out of school. So for me, access is very important and access is not just, im from the font face, say we have free quality education. Access is making sure that the system work for girls. And ill say it progresses me. Lake is been done because the people of desolation lead the, the most radical campaign of scene in my life. And thats the campaign for brit pregnant girls to be in school. Weve seen all of the progress weve that women girls, young people. We saw that girls over tics out of school during the bola outbreak. They stood up for their rights to education. So weve had a situation where scenario described by joseph in there which sounds almost utopian and was actually successful. But eric, working with people on the ground as a journalist and with a youth program, im sure that the stories you hear a wildly different from what were hearing from joseph. And can you tell me what young people express to you as their Biggest Challenges in this country . We talk about the issues of educational issues of employment. It is quite perceived in a different way as it is been perceived in the lenses of the powers that made. So when you go to the place now to tell you about employment, but you see a lot of young people out there who are not employed in a situation. Sometimes you see people would not have access to all certain opportunities, even if they have the qualifications or less they have to affiliate themselves to the powers that be. Or i was listening to the points of daniel who couldnt contribute or in school. That is the same situation when you talk to you maybe or people that are into the okada, commercial or writing which is a motorbike. Yeah. Some of them you find out that are they are there because they dont feel like been there, but because you dont have the opportunities or platforms to move forward. Let me come back to your doctor because we are hearing that there is a disconnect. I mean, surely the policy that youre creating behind closed doors sound wonderful, but the implementation 0. Where, where, where does, where does it get lost . So if you look back at how soon as developed over the years, you knew there are growth has been in stop, stop, stop it, stop by then, what has kept us going is how we as the people are resilient and continue to adapt and involve in how we implement design and roll up policies as joseph instead think the development of the radical inclusion policy was quite m inclusive. And we didnt have the validation to the of the Implementation Plan and much an evaluation plan. So it shows that as the country we will not talk in the doing things in the same always we are moving towards doing things in better and more fissions waste. So thats why we have a whole of government approach to Human Capital development. Not just looking at Education Health and are we coach about all the factors that interlinked this vector . So if we say were talking about enhancing and getting farmers to get more seed and fertilize as is also linking those farmers to market, linking them to the school fit in program lincoln, this good for the program to the nutrition program. So its having a whole Systems Approach to development. What is the thing is when you implement new policies, impact takes a while to shoot. So thats why we look at intermediate outcomes for now. That number of farmers benefits a number of children in school. We know that investments need to continue to need to be consistent. The need to be owned by every put everybody. We are now looking towards how we can not be left behind in the 40 the industrial revolution. Because youve talked about the 4th industrial revolution. I must come to this because it surprised me dramatically that electricity penetration in this country is just above 20 percent. How can we be talking about robotics and big data when people dont even have access to power . So thats the thing. And when we, if we try to perceive it in the lines of this comes before the other, thats where we miss it. There are things that we can do together and we can do that in more efficient with lets as the person whos already doing it, mohammad, were hearing here that its possible to both be waiting for power supply and still innovate is as true or is the dr. Dreaming, youre wanting a disclaimer. We already have seen moody that walks in different contexts. Yeah. People are develop solutions that can actually be replicated or can be scaled up. We have, as you said, a literally just above 20 percent access to energy. We have wind mills that we locally fabricated. All we need is one to Scalable Solutions and replicate for more communities. We develop Hydro Generator just from scrubs. All the solutions can solve our energy crisis, but the causes them does not provide a asta approaching institute of our commer took was caleb and then compete for the rest of the world. I know got my, my city are restricted with funding unloaded areas and the wants of pirates. I said so small. So energy is needed and speaking of i know that you already solving those problems. I want to ask solid gimme this one of your innovations. Can you explain what this is because youre trying to solve the problem of energy in this country. Yes. Our from in our driveway. Hundreds, very excited. Shes clapping for years. So i decided to use waste mathias to build the 1st d b and not just from scratch. Oh, and its from scrubs. And then ive been able to use this to install in over 2000 community to 1000 households. All of this can be scaled up and it can be replicated across different domains. And we are so be our own problem with our own solutions within mid in civilian. So all we need is a platform to, for us to really succeed in these ventures. And then be the next l m max of africa be the next bill gates from africa, which we already of cindys potentials. All right, i want to hear from eric because weve heard that the Rural Community than the youth in the rural areas are experiencing vastly different challenges from the was being faced here in the city. Can you tell me what some of those are . Ok, so we say for it on is not serial you and this is quite common taken from what he was saying earlier. Everything is actually centralized in freetown. So when you have access to certain opportunities for young people, maybe you look at internet penetration. Even those here in the or city do not have access to very much or Better Internet access. Now when you go to the rural area, maybe the kind of university or whatever we have, everybody wants to come to free town coming to probably College Going to the college of medicine. Of course we have july or the ones that are now doing, you know, to that point, but we need more things that are to be published or decentralized. We dont need every team to be around freetown, also another keeping that you need to take into consideration when we talk about many things like female or gender impairment issues. You find out that many of the people you see there are a champion in this causes probably they are within the city. So how much more can we try to, which are people in orders or areas are right . I speaking of women, i have to come back to josephine because youve been accused of making all the noise only here in the center. Ah festival. Do you agree with that assessment . And if it through what can be done to penetrate the knowledge, the information, the wealth possible owens are correct. That points because of the work i do is across the country. So there are costs. Positive noise is a very is, is, is really fully across the country. The walk edward papa school is making sure that while 17000. 00 out of school girls were living in Rural Communities, who somehow a pregnant will be left out of it because of the system that perpetually discriminates, their access to education, that we roam safe spaces for them this is a place as i tell you when i walk in Rural Communities. I see that the only thing of some of these girls have at the same spaces, growing up a girl in this country is a challenge, is a struggle. Alright, let me ask how j people are being responsive because as the woman was in a position of leadership, i imagine you going to stand in front of a council of men to tell them about something. Do you think they would listen to you . You know, were being told that we need to do things differently. You could want that you might be doing it, but is the country ready . Im going to talk a lot about the patriarchy, because i work with ministration. I will put re usable sanitary pads. I remember the 1st time i page saw a bunch of men in new jersey. This is in the west. They said to me, oh, you sound like ellen mosque, maybe this will come true. Its not because they believed in me, but because they were telling me i was been delusional. But however, a year later, when i developed my product and again, pitched in front of a judge, a panel of men, many of them didnt understand my product. And many of them were just shying away from the topic. And again, i just said, we live in a world where majority are women. And if we as men or we as a society and not addressing issues affecting half of the population, how are we going to like make progress, danny . Oh no, daniel. Once more to mohammed, i have a question for you. Which, you know, im just wondering if youre also suffering from the same predicament where youre going to a banker and telling them about your great innovation. But theyre simply from another generation, are you facing the sort of challenge . Exactly. So its, its, i know didnt know the problem the know what to do, but because the mindsets are different and the up approach to problems are different. Thats every start. Some people will even prefer by in 2000 antennas, are brought done by the localised sauce, the ones that are cheaper on that if they did mention ads, kindly get us as an itself. So it says sometimes difficulty with sicilian support in saline on businesses, even though we have the opportunity, thanks to look our content that gives us the opportunity to have touch at present to representation of local mid product in all business places. But even our doubts, how many southerners actually been selling on business . There was the, i didnt know you guarantee it is not, its not so by monday to wants in puerto thinks, but it fixed them for them to really, re