By Kabelo Mollo
In my day job at Lesotho’s first online radio station I have a weekly session with our fifteen or so interns. The idea is to impart whatever little knowledge I have on (station and other) management and to get a sense from anybody in attendance whether station management might be a career path they’d like to follow.
I’m very young in the broadcast media space and most of the things I’ve learned have been self taught but in Dallas Tee, Deeva Mahase and Mr Maps I’ve had great mentors, so I am confident in my abilities. In the art of leadership though I don’t think you can ever stop growing and learning. So, part of the reason I host those sessions is to learn from the interns too. Young people of today have access to so much information, it would be short sighted not to engage them with a view of acquiring knowledge.
In our first session this week I enquired about who these guys regarded as noteworthy leaders. Quickly I got a response that wanted to clarify if I was speaking about Lesotho which was followed by a scoff of disdain. I was intrigued by this and pressed on, enquiring this time about leadership figures in politics.
Silence was the response. Then I asked about whether they’d be voting this year. To a man they vowed “absolutely not”. One participant wasn’t even aware there were elections this year. When I tried to coax them in to a reaction by telling them they couldn’t complain when a government they didn’t like took power they assured me they wouldn’t as they accepted their fate as it would be.
Kids, between the ages of 20 and 25 already showing such despondency. No fight, no inclination to change the system. Just defeature. I was flabbergasted and saddened, the young people have been browbeaten in to accepting mediocrity. This happened in the week that would culminate in Moshoeshoe’s Day… Where were those values? Where were those principles? Where was that spirit?
From my purview we’ve had a leadership vacuum in politics for a little while. Self interest and narrow political machinations seem to have usurped the status quo. Politicians have decided they are going to fill their proverbial boots at the cost of the nation. So, when the biggest voting bloc responds with apathy and despondency, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Unfortunately, even beyond politics it’s difficult to find a hero in the other spaces in our lives.
Perhaps ntate Matekane who continues to prove where there’s a will there’s a way, and a few others, perhaps the good people at Liselo Labs with their great research and development work, the NUL innovation lab too, but there very few. Even in the arts and cultural spaces there has been barely a whimper from those who are meant to hold a mirror up to society. And so I ask again, where are those values Moshoeshoe espoused? Who is the figure that will remind, particularly the youth, what it means to be a leader in this kingdom?
As a nation we recently lost the ever so regal principal chief of Mokhotlong. I was struck by one thing at his funeral, and it was how emotional every speaker was. All but maybe two speakers were moved to tears when opining about Morena Mathealira. What a profound impact somebody like that had… We can only hope that his legacy will inspire more to walk in his footsteps. I don’t wish to wade in to treacherous territory but I have to wonder whether it isn’t time our regent was given a more prominent role in active leadership of the state. Perhaps he can reinvigorate the masses in our society. I don’t believe there’s a silver bullet, nor am I naïve enough to think any one thing might be a magical elixir, but I think it’s time we tried a couple of different solutions. The reform process is still in place, and I for one believe in it. I see it’s become popular to denigrate and denounce them, but I still think we’ll be better off as a country after their recommendations are adopted by parliament.
Every time Moshoeshoes Day comes about, it feels like we should be doing more to get closer to his values. It feels like the nation needs to reboot and return to the ethos he lived. The Moshoeshoe governance code and its effective implementation will be good start, but as society we also need to find our path back to his teachings.
The young people need to free themselves of the apathy and related despondency. They need to snap out of the lethargy and take the proverbial bull by the horns. The rest of us need to be much better examples for them to follow. We need a moral and ethical revolution that will remind us to put our nationhood first. We need to actively be better in everything we do. This Moshoeshoes Day, we need to honour the memory of Morena Moshoeshoe, the founding father of this once great kingdom! Pula.
