NEWS | Youth in action: The role of the youth in nation-building
By Christel Castro
Kilos Ko Youth (KY), the youth arm of the Office of Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan, hosted a training program titled Kilos Ko Youth Fellowship Program (KYFP) wherein youth leaders from all around the country gathered and learned essential lessons in leadership, political communications, and advocacy-building.
Preparing for action
The KYFP is the pilot project of KY that aims to foster youth engagement and participation. The week-long seminar included a series of talks and workshops about leadership, youth empowerment, political communication, and campaigns and advocacy building.
For its fifth batch, the project gathered a total of 300 participants all over the country including senior high school students, college students, youth leaders, and young professionals. The week-long event started on March 13, 2021 and ended on March 20, 2021, which consisted of two days of talks and another two days for workshops.
The topics of the talks include youth leadership, youth empowerment, political communications and advocacy-building, and campaign-planning and launching.
The first day of the talk on March 13, 2021, featured three speakers. Neil Soria, the speaker for the topic of Youth Leadership, emphasized how leadership requires the concept of ‘pakikipagkapwa’.
While Ronald Gem Celestial, in his topic_ on Political Communications, reiterated the need for cooperation to disseminate information. Finally, the speaker for the topic of Advocacy Building, Bettina Manuel, reminded the importance of compassion to the people.
“You have to be compassionate with your constituents to know what they really need because we want them to empower themselves,” Manuel affirmed.
On March 20, 2021, the second day featured the topic of Campaign where Mr. Jiggy Caluag highlighted the importance of action in campaign.
The session also featured Mr. Raoul Manuel’s discussion on Youth Empowerment where he asserted the need for collective action.
“Our true power comes with how effectively we advance the struggles of the oppressed people. There is power in numbers,” said Manuel.
Meanwhile, the workshops occurred on March 15 and 17, 2021 with the topics Design Thinking and Personal Branding respectively.
During their workshops, participants were able to produce outputs that can help improve the nation. This active participation of the youth showed their desire to tackle national issues by engaging in discourses and organizing initiatives.
The next step
The KYFP organizers deemed the event a success as some of their participants showed interest in forwarding their cause.
KY aims to gather more participants to embark on the journey of building quality and trained leaders for the country. The organization aims to create more initiatives for the upcoming 2022 national elections.
KY is an organization inspired by Senator Pangilinan that aims to gather the youth in forwarding progressive principles and advocating for a more robust democracy. They deem the youth as an essential part of political participation and leadership.
