Cyprian Fernandes' Sunday Masala: Can youth save Goa? Source: Goan Voice UK - Daily Newsletter of 24 July 2011 at www.goanvoice.org.uk
If you are reading this after having been to the Goan Festival in London, you would have been impressed with the young adults and youths helping Carmen Miranda press home the message of Save Goa now before environmental rape destroyed the tiny motherland. Fiona Lobo who is leading the London team has done a fabulous job in galvanising her team members in a totally committed and focused way. Their task would have been to recruit you in the campaign to save Goa. They would have canvassed you, one-on-one, face-to-face, a style that is more familiar with US Federal and State elections. What I am most impressed with is the fact that a bunch of people have decided to stand up and be counted in Goa's hour of need. Carmen Miranda has taken on an immense challenge to weed out all the illegal mining in Goa, put in place stringent environmental protection safeguards and the accountable and transparent monitoring of these safeguards. In other words, to ensure that Goa's environmental protection is dragged into line with the rest of the world. There are indications that most of the mines are illegal, documentation is based on falsehoods and there is no policing of mining practices with the result the environmental damage has gone unnoticed until now. It will take many millions of dollars to achieve the lofty but necessary ideals of environmental conservation. It will also take the collective will of the people of Goa to achieve it. However, with the level of institutionalised corruption cancering (an illegal invention of a verb) Goa, I wonder if change will only result when the innocent young adults living outside and outside of Goa make a concerted effort to change the status quo? I was delighted to learn of the depth and passion of the young participants in the recent Goa Youth Convention on Environmental Issues and Development. The young people are reported to have had Environment Minister Aleixo Sequeira squirming from the grilling he received. I would be the last person to advocate any kind of violence especially of the verbal grilling kind (something I was always guilty of in my past) but pursuing the truth without malice for the individual is an art. In Goa there is always the inevitable danger of making issues personal, resulting in vitriol and abuse with the result that quiet, considered thinking and debate are the victims. I hope the current crop of Goan youngsters in the world do not catch that particular virus. I also think that the young folk in Goa would benefit greatly from the experience of their overseas cousins. In this day and age of great communication, one need not cross continents when Skype will do the job for you. If we are to learn anything from history, the recent youth uprisings (bar the violence) are proof of the power of the young adults and the youth. Perhaps some great example of the power of the youth were: The 1942 Quit India youth uprising which was an integral part of the fight for independence from India. The 1976 Soweto student uprising which ignited the final run-in to majority rule and release of Nelson Mandela from detention and, of course, which conscience can ever forget the role that both black and white youths played in the fight for de-segregation and equality for blacks in the US. More recently is the memory of Arab youth sweeping across Middle East in revolt. On the other side of the coin, there is history of powerful Hitler Youth. Brilliant as far as the Nazi's were concerned, but a scourge on the rest of the world. Youth collectives can err, like those that gathered recently to protest against the use of English as a MOI in Goa. The onus should not be on children and young adults to clean countries of the evils of corruption and bad government but often they seem to be the last resort. Hey before anyone starts throwing spears at me, I am not advocating revolution, just eyeballing points in history. Comments to skip...@live.com.au Check out his website http://cyprianfernandes.blogspot.com
