BUJUMBURA, September 27th (ABP) – The States Parties to the African Youth Charter have undertaken, among other things, to recognize and promote beliefs and practices that contribute to development and to establish institutions and programs for development, documentation, preservation and dissemination of culture, according to Article 20 of the said Charter of the African Union (AU), in its paragraph 1 points b and c.
As part of promoting and protecting the moral and traditional values recognized by the Community, States having already ratified the African Youth Charter have also committed to eliminating all traditional practices which harm physical integrity and dignity of women.
Other commitments of those States consist of working together with educational institutions, youth organizations and other partners to raise awareness, teach, inform young people about culture, values and endogenous African knowledge, to stimulate creativity among young people in the promotion of cultural values and traditions by presenting them in a form acceptable to young people and in a language and forms to which young people can refer.
In the same way, the said States Parties have a duty to implement and intensify the teaching of African languages as an integral part of academic and non-academic training to accelerate economic, social, political and cultural development, and to promote intercultural awareness through exchange programs between young people and youth organizations.
Given that the member countries of the AU having already ratified the said Charter, recognize that the evolution towards a society and a knowledge-based economy is based on New Information and Communication Technologies (NICT), which have contributed to creating a dynamic culture and globalized awareness among young people, they are committed to promoting access to the latter.
Thus, the promotion of widespread access to NICTs should be recognized as a means of teaching, creating jobs, interacting effectively with the world and promoting harmony, tolerance and appreciating other youth cultures, as specified in paragraph 2 of the same article, without forgetting the promotion of local production of information and access to NICT content.
The States Parties to the African Youth Charter are also committed to making young people and youth organizations understand the link that exists between contemporary youth culture and traditional African culture, in order to enable them to express this symbiosis through theater, art, writing, music and other forms of cultural and artistic expression. Those States which have already ratified the African Youth Charter adopted on July 2, 2006 in Banjul in the Gambia, including Burundi, have finally, through its article 20, committed to helping young people to use the positive elements of the phenomenon of globalization such as science, technology and ICT, to promote new forms of cultures that link the past to the future.