AfriForum Youth challenges NYDA
2011-03-02 21:16
Johannesburg - AfriForum Youth on Wednesday submitted business plans to the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) for financial assistance to challenge it on its stance that it did not discriminate along racial lines.
"This follows after the undertaking by the NYDA last year made to AfriForum Youth during a meeting they had, that minorities will no longer be discriminated against on racial grounds," said the minority rights group spokesperson Charl Oberholzer.
The plans, which were collected from "minority" South Africans under 35 in the past two months, were submitted by a delegation of the youth organisation at the NYDA's head office.
However, NYDA chairperson Andile Lungisa said he was not aware of the business plans delivered by the youth organisation.
"The business plans are supposed to be delivered at NYDA branches [in respective areas] and not at the head office," he said.
Lungisa said plans delivered at the branches were recorded in the NYDA system, which he did not access.
Oberholzer said the business plans were the first to be submitted by the AfriForum Youth, "and if the NYDA remains true to its word, also the first group that will not be evaluated on racial grounds".
"It will be a test for the NYDA that they cannot afford to fail," he said.
"The NYDA and other government initiatives should afford all South Africans the opportunity to create wealth by means of the creation of small businesses, instead of only dividing the wealth," Oberholzer said.
"Financial support for job creation should know no colour."
"AfriForum Youth is still receiving applications for financing and will continue contacting the NYDA on behalf of minorities [and] is also committed to monitor the evaluation process of the business plans that were presented to the NYDA today," he said.
Asked if the business plans submitted by the youth organisation would get special attention as they were collected from a "minority", Lungisa said: "They exploited us yesterday and today they are a minority?"
"They are not special, they just want to make themselves special," he said.
"In South Africa there is equal treatment for everyone... the youth of this country is treated equally," Lungisa said.
- SAPA
