By Emily Setona
QWAQWA – Learners from several schools in Maluti-a-Phofung (MAP) took part in a public speaking competition centred around topics on service delivery.
This exercise allows learners to express how the lack of service delivery in their respective communities affects them as the youth, while building their confidence through public speaking.
“Our community is plagued with a lack of service delivery issues and as an organisation we decided to engage the youth to hear from them the service delivery issues that affect them, and create a debate to find solutions to these problems through the platform of public speaking. This way they can build their confidence in presenting their own ideas and solutions for problems in our community,” Thandi Mkhwanazi from Youth in Action (YIA) said.
Rorisang Leeu of Mohato Senior Secondary School (SSS) said the following when speaking to The Guard: “We chose the topic ‘Municipal health services’ because we realized that people in our community do not receive adequate medical attention.
“We did our research by visiting our local clinics and this matter is very important to us because people die from not getting proper medical attention and some health care practitioners don’t show any care to patients as they spend a lot of time on their phones doing their own things while people suffer.”
Lerato Motloung of Lekgulo SSS chose a rather interesting topic of street lighting contributing to light pollution and poor behaviour among teenagers.
“My perspective on the issue of street lighting is that it causes light pollution and no one considers this to be a serious issue that is harming the atmosphere and young people. Some of my peers take advantage of the streetlights being on and stay out as late as they want without considering their parents and the consequences of such behaviour.
“Yes, I do understand that the streetlights are there to make people feel safe at night, but I think that they are causing more harm than good.”
Competition judges Thando Tshabalala and Philisiwe Dlamini said they judged the learners on the flowing criteria: presentation in terms of the neatness of their uniform, their body language, voice projection and eye contact while also listening to the content of their argument, whether it is factual, well researched and based on reality.
The results were as follows: third position went to Metsi Matso SSS, second position went to Lekgulo SSS while the first position was taken by Mohato SSS.
The winners received certificates, a trophy and gift bags as well as a trip to Durban for first place winners.
Learners of Mohato were very excited to be announced as the first-position winners and described the victory as a major achievement for their school.
