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This week in the Khuta – A bleak struggling struggle

Over the past few weeks sparks were flying in several debates over the Namibian children born in exile, who seem to be convinced that they deserve preferential treatment because their parents’ blood water this country’s freedom.
I feel that they are missing the point of being born in exile. I think that most of you will agree with me when I say that there is rich history to be told here, something that one must be proud of. However the demands of the ‘Struggle kids’ completely soil that rich history and truth be told that is not the way their parents would want to be honoured and I bet their parents are looking on in shame at their children’s antics.
Demonstrators are demanding a future of milk and honey and a life of being spoon fed with ‘a silver spoon’. Come on, we all want that life. I must admit, I want that life too. A nation of hard working people has looked on and some have sympathised with the group while others have looked on in laughter as the police took a few of them away from the SWAPO headquarters. How do they expect someone to take them seriously if they act like that? How can someone demand that they be given a job when they do not have the qualifications to get the job?.
The struggle kids are quick to point out how they were in exile and did not get the opportunities to study and acquire the knowledge needed to get good jobs, but forget that every Namibian in the country regardless of being born in exile or not, is equally entitled to aid from the government and should not demand preferential treatment. If they want paradise they must toil for it just like every one else. We all want a piece of the pie, but we have to wash our hands, sit at the table and give our thanks before we can hungrily sink out teeth into the pie.
Prime Minister Nahas Angula also sympathised with the group and said that they need to learn skills in order to get the jobs they want. But let’s all be honest here, even if they do get the skills they need to get the jobs, what happens to the graduates from tertiary institutions who aren’t struggle kids but are also seeking jobs from the government? Does that mean they should take a back seat and let the ‘struggle kids’ shine?
Giving them the attention that they are so desperately and dementedly seeking will bring on future chaos as their children will also demand the same of the Namibian government and this will become  an ongoing circle of “I am a struggle kid” this and “I deserve a post in the government” that.
They must learn that a fight for something that comes at the expense of others is not a true fight for liberation but a way of bondage. The moment we start treating people in groups favourable them, we discriminate against the others. Namibians are still divided and do not need any more divisions.
My advice to the struggle kids is for them to grow up and deal with the fact that one has to work hard to live in paradise. It’s just like going to heaven. The road there is filled with so many obstacles that one must get through in order to see the pearly gates.
Instead of directing your energy to toy-toying and spending nights out in minus zero degrees weather chanting “I am a struggle kid”, accept that the struggle is over, get jobs the proper and normal way and keep in mind that the more you chant “I am a struggle kid” the more you will struggle until your dying day. The tongue is a very powerful weapon that authors our destinies remember, there is something in a name.

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