We need youth leaders, not politicians

During the last weekend, I was intrigued by former Universiti Malaya student leader Fahmi Zainol starting up a youth movement. I believe it is a good idea since I was conned into registering and voting for Parlimen Belia.

Of all the things they did, the license plate decor was a sheer disappointment for me of what youth parliamentarians are supposed to be.

I am glad for Fahmi, but at the same time sceptical about what he is doing and his intentions, particularly since the voiced objective is to "replace" current leaders who are retiring or leaving.

My scepticism lies in the lack of clarification, because it sounds as if he aims to replace politicians, not leaders. And honestly, we have enough of those queueing up to replace the ones in place on both sides of the political divide.

We have enough politicians. What we are lacking in Malaysia are leaders, not politicians, especially intellectually aware ones.

The youth, particularly those in universities, need to grow up and be globally aware of who and what people are saying. After all, youth is equated with unbridled passion in causes, particularly anti-establishment, even university gate-crashing.

First of all, I expect youth leaders to be knowledgable regardless of what they study. If they are scholars of religion, I expect them to understand the viewpoints voiced by Reza Aslan who published books on historical Islam and Jesus, and Karen Armstrong who intellectually plotted out the history behind God.

If they study information technology, I expect them to know of Jan Koum, the local startup scenes like Startup 500 and MaGIC, angel investors and even the growth of the mobile application industry by Malaysians.

For example, what websites promote crowd funding for Malaysian entrepreneurs? How can you encourage more “Bumipreneurs” which MaGIC is having trouble with?

If they are studying economics, they should be able to talk of Piketty's "Capital in the 21st Century", Stiglitz's "The Price of Inequality" or even go so far to read Philippe Legraine's "European Spring" and see how to come up with an Asean model.

Even Esquire Malaysia featured the first two books last November in their Inequality issue, which I personally found ironic. Such questions on salaries and wages, household incomes and even increasing tertiary graduates in the workforce require solutions urgently.

If they are interested in contributing apolitically to social enterprise and causes, they have role models such as fellow columnist Lyana Khairudin and even Syed Azmi Alhabshi which they can emulate.

The former is not only speaking of social enterprise, though. She’s also a learned scientist in the field of HPV and HIV at Universiti Malaya. The latter is a trained pharmacist.

To summarise, we need intellectual, empathetic leaders first even before broach the subject of political power.

We need those who do not look for political support, but voice out what needs to be discussed for the betterment of the nation as a whole in social issues, economics, and even entrepreneurial and technological development.

In other words, do not be led by politicians. You lead them to your cause through viable solutions.

For if there is anything I know about the youth, there is creativity in their passion. This is their greatest ability that us old fuddy duddies do not have. The older we get, the less creative we become and the more dependent we become on these younger ones to come up with solutions and ask the right questions.

This is due to the fact that the older we get, the more jaded we get with everything, and set fixatedly in our ways. There are more issues out there for the youth to consider than our generation had to.

The education blueprint would have been a brilliant starting point. At the same time, immigration and foreign workers is another. Increasing the participation of women in the workforce.

Socially, issues such as civic mindedness even to the point of throwing trash in a bin, giving up a seat on public transportation or even flushing a public toilet is still an issue in Malaysia.

But all of these do not need political backing. All it needs is a group of non-government individuals (Syed Azmi’s term for what he’s doing) to go out there and do what they do without preaching, politicking or even asking for favour.

In the end, it is an effort to get closer to the people that matter, Malaysians everywhere, regardless of race, religion or class. That is the basis of a leader we need in Malaysia today.

I hope Fahmi and his friends in the recently established Anak Muda Harapan Malaysia can clarify this once they return from their trip to the East Coast to help with the flood clean-up. Till then, I wish them all the best in living up to their namesake. – January 15, 2015.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.