guest column:Brighton Taruberekera THE structure that you find in all of Zimbabwe’s political parties has what is called a youth wing. Attracting young blood is probably the main reason why political parties have established youth wings. Ideally, these should be capable of addressing the under-recruitment of young people into the strategic positions within the framework of the party as well as the government (especially across the Legislature and the Executive). The level of independence of youth wings vary but they are largely dependent on the mother party both ideologically and financially. Youth wings – as a platform for youth inclusion and representation in politics are undermined by dependence and excessive influence of the mother party which tend to alter youth input except for the purposes of ‘protecting’ those in the main structures who retain and exclusively wield decision-making powers. The concept of exclusion by inclusion was probably best captured by Maureen Kademaunga in January 2013 when she stated that “the structure that you find in all of Zimbabwe’s political parties has what is called a youth wing … this is a strategy to keep young people content and yet far from the actual decision-making structures; that is exclusion by inclusion because the youth wing … (is a) sub and all decisions are made by the main wing”. There are both the women’s wing and youth league in the main parties, but the Constitution of Zimbabwe is silent on the ‘youth quota”. Section 124(1)(b) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe provides for sixty seats to be reserved for women. This is a commendable move with regards to women empowerment and a positive move towards addressing gender disparities. However, the same Constitution does not reserve any seats for the youth who are then forced to compete with the party heavyweights who already have the financial muscle and technical backbone for a ticket to the National Assembly. Constitutionally speaking, for one to compete as a candidate either for council or National Assembly, he or she has to be 21 and above. The other requirement is Zimbabwean citizenship. Thus, literally, there is no legal instrument that bars the youth from contesting in their parties’ primary elections or parliamentary elections. However, because of a period of more than two decades of economic quandary our nation has found itself in, most youths have never been gainfully employed or are currently unemployed such that they lack the financial muscle and even practical experience with regard to administration and governance. The liberalisation of party politics for youth to compete with seasoned politicians is thus not a democratic move at all. Neither is it in the spirit of such, but rather a facade of youth inclusion which is in actual sense non existent. Admittedly, the youth do participate in politics and some youths have made it to Zimbabwean mainstream politics but for many it is largely a tale of ‘exclusion by inclusion’. In exploring ‘the tale of exclusion by inclusion’, I shall briefly explore the cases of th