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Pacific Youth Festival – a year on

3 August 2007

The Pacific Youth Festival was a celebration of how young people lead policy change and innovation

In July 2006, the Regional Youth Caucus of the South Pacific was supported by CYP to attend and be present at the first ever Pacific Youth Festival, in French Polynesia. The event was a celebration of how young people lead policy change and innovation. It was also the starting point for a number of changes for the RYC, and their engagement in the region.

The Pacific Youth Festival was borne out of the 3rd World Youth Festival in Spain in 2004. Approximately 10,500 young people gathered there for a nine-day forum where youth platforms from different continents were presented. Very few people from the Pacific region attended. As a result, the Ministry for Youth Affairs in French Polynesia and the Union Polynésienne pour la Jeunesse (UPJ), Tahiti’s primary youth organisation, offered an opportunity to have a Pacific region forum, which became the Pacific Youth Festival.

The organising committee for the festival comprised of mostly non-youths. The youth voice was provided by two members of the Regional Youth Caucus, Pacific chairperson and Tongan representative Elaine Howard and Vania Kenning from the Cook Islands.

The Youth Festival drew together more than one thousand young people between the ages of 16 and 30 from 22 Pacific Island countries and territories. It was the largest gathering of Pacific youth to breach the traditional distinction between former British, former French and United States-influenced Pacific island nations. It provided a forum for the discussion of development issues and saw the drafting and adoption of the first Pacific Youth Charter which detailed the major areas of concern for young Pacific Islanders today. The Charter remains available through the website of the Office of the United Nations’ High Commissioner for Human Rights; see http://www.ohchr.org/pacific/docs/Youth_Charter_English-2006.pdf

Among the outcomes of the Festival was the reconstitution of the Pacific Youth Council (PYC). The Pacific Youth Council ‘is a regional, non-government, voluntary association of territorial and national youth organisations established in 1996 to encourage and strengthen territorial and national youth organisations and promote a regional identity for Pacific Youth.’

The Regional Youth Caucus were delighted to have one of their members, Jacque Sekoula Koroivulaono of Fiji, elected as President of the Council. She retains tenure until the second Pacific Youth Festival, which is scheduled for 2009 in Fiji. Two other RYC representatives were also elected to the Council, Reginald Kipe (Vanuatu) and Jasper Anisi (Solomon Islands).

In her message to the PYC, the newly inducted President dared members to dream. She also picked up on the theme of the Commonwealth, respect and understanding. ‘We dream of a future where respect for different races, cultures, religion, age groups and gender are moral values upheld by young people,’ Koroivulaono stated.

The Regional Youth Caucus presented to a packed seminar room on their regional work, under the theme of ‘active citizenship’. RYC members discussed the role of the RYC and its projects, including the partnership with Radio Australia’s On the Mat programme and a human rights initiative involving direct lobbying of heads of government of all member countries. Most especially, the RYC explained the six priority areas for their term with the CYP: strengthening family relationships, youth health and well-being, youth education and training, youth enfranchisement, youth participation, networks and partnerships.

During the Festival, the RYC handed out fabric bags and stickers with the flags of member countries and the six priority areas for the RYC printed on them. Even now, these advocacy tools are prominent in Pacific Island nations.

The RYC continues to work on the outcomes from the Pacific Youth Festival a year later. The Fijian representative and PYC President Jacque Sekoula Koroivulaono continues in her role of steering the PYC. The RYC continue with the projects outlined at the Festival, often with the support of those who attended the Festival but are not members of the RYC. And the 58 resolutions of the first Pacific Youth Charter remain a foremost consideration for innovation led by the Regional Youth Caucus across the region.

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