Totalitarian talk shop: NYDA should apologise for inviting Gaddafi’s youth league

The DA Youth believes that the National Youth Development Agency should apologise for hosting the youth organisation of Libyan dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, at its recent World Festival of Youth and Students.

We understand that members of the General Union of Jamahiriya Students attended last year’s R100 million festival. The General Union is backed by Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. Indeed, since the 1970s it has been a capital offence in Libya for the youth to join any rival group, and last year the General Union hosted the Arab Students and Youth Summit in Tripoli, where Gaddafi was awarded a “first-degree medal of leadership”.

The DA Youth believes it is shameful that the South African government paid for the hosting of Gaddafi’s radical student organisation. It constitutes a moral failing of the worst kind.

I will ask my colleagues in the national legislature to submit parliamentary questions to ascertain how much of the R100 million spent on this festival was designated towards the hosting of Gaddafi’s youth delegates.

We would also like to know from NYDA chairperson, Andile Lungisa, how this squares with his recent preposterous claims that the World Festival of Youth and Students helped to precipitate pro-democracy protests in North Africa and the Middle East. Lungisa should explain how pampering young pro-Gaddafi zealots at the state’s expense could possibly have contributed to pro-democracy protests in North Africa.

Media Enquiries:

Mbali Ntuli
DA Youth Chairperson
072 118 8556

Aimee Franklin
DA Youth Director
072 232 0127