IF I WERE A MINISTER. Directing my article to the minister of information and publicity (Prof.

Jonathan Moyo), I would like to first pass my sincere gratitude and happiness due to the appointment of such a young and energetic leader into the ministry. As a youth I believe information and publicity marks the foundation of our livelihoods as young people, hence its the reason why we roam around seeking news about our country on daily basis. I think there are lots of gaps that needs filling in. I will then dwell into some of the areas I feel needs attention of the government so as to benefit the young people It is one of our concerns as youths for the government to look into issues of licensing community radio stations as they can fill the gap of broadcasting. Community radios act as a voice of the youths in communities, were they can freely express their grievances and concerns about the communities that harbour them. Community Radio Stations can create employment opportunities for youth as well e.g. (DJs, Editors, Producers etc).Zimbabwe Broadcasting Holdings cannot consume all the talent out there in the country but can realise only a few who have accreditation. I also feel there is need of aid in starting up Resource Centres in remote areas around the country. The government can do so by either funding youth organisations to do those projects or by constructing the resource centres itself. We still have areas in Zimbabwe where the nationally recognised papers such as (Herald, Sunday Mail etc) are hardly distributed, but young people in those areas have the right to accessing information at any given time. Lack of resources in such areas will then come in as barriers to accessibility of the information. This then calls for corrective measures by the government through the ministry of information and publicity to maybe take into consideration allocation of resource centres to such communities as these will fill the information gap that is currently there. It is sad that a young person like me can only get the Herald paper 2/3 weeks after its publication and still feels its a new paper to him/her due to the inability to acquire those papers in time e.g. Siakobvu in Kariba rural. They end up having a misconception of what exactly will be happening in the country and hence will remain lagging behind. Construction of internet powered resource centres or that without internet is a solution to such problems and the government should take that into consideration. The National broadcasting used to be excellent throughout the country when we were still around the age of 6-16 years. Its now another story as the airing system or the waves are no longer supporting all areas as it used to. I come to think that maybe it is because of outdated equipment still in use and cannot meet the international airing standards, but the real reason remains unknown to me. However it is a thing that I have came to notice and is of great concern to me as well as other youth out there. This problem is mainly facing border towns such as Kariba where some areas face difficulties in connecting to national channels either radio or television. In Kariba people are now listening to KARIBA FM which is a Zambian radio station and has little relevance to us the Zimbabwean community as the programmes that are being broadcasted are mainly Zambian programmes with Zambian information. It is then a government task to work on issues of national broadcasting so as to service all areas equally without leaving others outside the bracket. The above are the major issues I have noticed in as much as information and publicity concerns us as the youth of Zimbabwe. We urge the government to aid us in dealing with such issues as they are affecting young people and hence fail us to reach our full potential. If other economies are doing it then, why cant we do it as well? We have the potential and YES WE CAN!!!!!