2nd Dialogue with Sarawak Youth

The 2nd Dialogue with Sarawak Youth on Continuing the Legacy of Freedom and Harmony under the 1Malaysia Concept was successfully held on Monday, 19 July 2010 at Kingwood Hotel, Sibu Sarawak. A total of 210 youth aged between 18 to 25 years old from high schools, institutions of higher learning, ethnic associations as well as youth organisation from in and around Sibu attended the event.

Themed Passing on the Torch to our Future Leaders,the Dialogue was organised to serve as a platform to engage the youth in discussing and understanding the importance of unity in order to continue the legacy of freedom and harmony that have been built through the blood, sweat and tears of our forefathers. The objectives of this dialogue are:

1) To engage the youth in understanding and safeguarding the freedom and harmony in the country, and;

2) To provide an avenue for the youth to discuss on current issues affecting their state and their future.

There were two paper presentations presented at the Dialogue. The first paper entitled “Continuing the Legacy of Freedom and Harmony under the 1Malaysia Concept: The Role of Sarawak’s Youth” was presented by Prof. Dr. Chandra Muzaffar, Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Yayasan 1Malaysia.

The second paper entitled “My Constitution” was presented by YBhg. Datuk J.C. Fong, State Legal Counsel. Presentations by the speakers were delivered in both Bahasa Malaysia and English. Each presentation was followed by a Question & Answer session where the youth had the opportunity to ask questions to the speakers pertaining to the paper presented.

In addition to paper presentations, there was also a Focus Group Discussion (FGD) session in which the youth were divided into four zones namely social, economic, governance and environment. Each zone was sub-divided into the followings sub-zone:

Social Zone: Sub-zone Social Ills (Crimes), Cultural Mix, Education and Quality of Life

Governance Zone: Sub-zone Governance, Elected Representatives, Rakyat & the Government and Government & Technology

Economic Zone: Sub-zone Employment Opportunity, Economy, SCORE and Job Market

Environment Zone: Sub-zone Development Plans, Climate Change, Our Planet and Clean & Green Environment

Each sub-zone was given the task to formulate queestions or comments to be posed to the YAB Pehin Sri Chief Minister of Sarawak during the Open Dialogue session in the afternoon. A total of 33 questions were formulated during the session.

In conjunction with the Dialogue, there was also an exhibition on SCORE organised by the Sarawak State Planning Unit and the Sarawak YES! programme.

The YES! programme, conceived by Angkatan Zaman Mansang (AZAM), SDI and AZAM's subsidiary, Faradale Media-M Sdn Bhd, is a youth programme set up to engage the youth to become more involved in their community.

The Youth Engaged in Social Innovation, Service, Education and Enterprise project or YES I SEE project is a component of the Sarawak YES! programme. The YES I SEE project is open to Sarawak youth aged 17 to 25 years, who were asked to come up with project ideas that could ultimately bring benefit to the State.

The programme was well received in Kuching, Kapit, Mukah, Sibu and Sarikei. The projects that the participants are working on are;

1) Kuching – manufacturing environmentally-friendly building materials, promoting Sarawak’s local delicacies, producing videos on Sarawak’s high-achieving youths, producing a book on Sarawak’s multi-ethnic communities and producing a website to promote tourism

2) Kapit – coming up with a self-defence programme for women and a new system to help find disabled people

3) Mukah – creating musical instruments from recycled materials

4) Sibu – creating artwork from recycled materials

5) Sarikei – producing and promoting local snails as a delicacy

The youth were very lucky indeed to experience this rare opportunity of meeting and speaking to our YAB Pehin Sri Chief Minister.

Sarawak Development Institute would like to take this opportunity to extend our sincere thank you to our distinguished speakers, all the youth, teachers and lecturers for their participations.

Youth of Bintulu, watch this space for you could be the lucky one attending the next Dialogue!