Gov’t Senator Proposes Mandatory National Service for Youth

Government Senator, Navel Clarke, is proposing compulsory national service for all Jamaican youth, as a means of developing their sense of service and discipline.

“I am convinced that it is time for Jamaica to adopt in treating with the young people from an early age… the discipline and behavioural norms in which a Christian and law abiding society exists,” Senator Clarke said.

He was making his contribution to the State of the Nation Debate in the Senate today (March 28).

The Senator stated that students who are leaving high schools and not going onto higher education should be assessed by trained guidance counsellors to “prepare them for the next journey in their lives.”

“My proposal is that those young people would have to spend at least two years in the army, not because they want to be soldiers, but (because) there exists every facet of skills and trades in that organisation…. and in the meantime they…would have to carry that discipline in and out of the army,” Senator Clarke said.

He asserted that young people must be steered towards the kind of discipline and way of life that is conducive to a law abiding society.
“I urge that serious thought be given to this proposal. It is something that I strongly recommend,” he stated.