Young Mozambicans are learning new ways to gain political traction

Young Mozambicans suffer from widespread political apathy, due to a distrust of current parties and to a lack of information about their electoral rights—and obligations. Local youth leader Roda Andrade Wilson Mondlane is working to change all that. Her group in Maputo holds Youth and Electoral Citizenship events, which bring young citizens and local politicians face to face with each other as well as with their respective challenges, rights and democratic duties. 

Mozambique has a high rate of electoral registration, but low turnout particularly among the young. How do young people feel about voting? 

Young people are not too optimistic about elections, for different reasons. Some simply are not interested in politics or are not aware of the importance of their role as voting citizens, due to the lack of education and access to information, which is a big issue in rural areas. Others are frustrated with the political process in general: Politicians appear to engage with young people during campaigns, but once elections are over suddenly pay less attention to their ideas and offer few forums for their participation. This happens all over the world of course, but in Mozambique there is also the feeling that there are no alternatives or any real political competition. The Frelimo party has ruled since independence in 1975, while opposition parties lack concrete political programmes and their popularity is often limited to certain regions. Therefore many young people feel that they have no significant choice in elections and abstain from voting altogether. 

How does political engagement among youth differ across the country?

There is definitely an urban-rural divide with regards to political interest and participation. The further you move away from the capital Maputo, where I live, the less information and fewer spaces there are for political debate and participation. This mostly has to do with the access to information: In 2017 only 6.6 per cent of the population had access to Internet, and this was concentrated in the capital. Access to many national and international institutions is also better in Maputo, due to the centralized structure of the political system.

How are you working to get the youth more involved?

One year ago we started a project called Youth and Electoral Citizenship. We organized events that brought together candidates for local government with young citizens, regardless of their political ideology, religion, level of education or occupation, to discuss the common challenges of their age group. The objective was to make local development programmes more responsive to the challenges faced by youth, as well as to strengthen political awareness amongst young people. Participants presented their issues to the candidates and discussed what should be done if they made it into office. We wanted to break with the common idea that young people are generally not interested in politics. What I saw is that the youth is frustrated because they feel their voice is not being heard. We met a lot of young people who have strong opinions and want to influence the public agenda for the better. And the politicians who participated realized that direct active engagement with youth is not a threat but actually helps them come up with better political programmes and gain trust.