In a couple of week's time Pulse and SDM, two student organizations, will fight the good fight at the Junior College in the KSJC council elections. 

I am always particularly interested in the dynamics of student politics and campaigning. 

Whatever the allegiances it is utterly preposterous to see so much political debate taking place at the Junior College - OK, agreed with some jeering and heckling on the way. 

Some see this enmity is way too much.

I disagree. 

I see it as a perfect poise because it is the initiation of dialectics that results in new ideas, it's completion that instigates change and it's rivalry that entices transformation.

I still can't fathom why people consider it iniquitous that youths are engaged in politics at school, community or national level. 

At the end of the day this is the core principle that governs the Vote 16 campaign.  For goodness sake, we are fine with young people sharing photo shoots with our politicians, expecting them to sit for endless examinations and tests, encouraging them to have summer and winter jobs (ha jkunu jaf xi jigifieri), consume alcohol at 17 years of age and all of a sudden when it comes to designing communities, they are out of the 'architects studios'.  Claptrap. 

Young people have virtuoso ideas.

They want to lead, they are interested in making themselves heard, they conglomerate in groups and shed their ambitions to help others. 

Let me go back in time.

Whilst I wouldn't dare refer to myself as being atypical, I lived the 80s head-on, probably because what I got from my parents was the conviction that if you want change you need to be part of that narrative.  My parents, my family, never shied away from confronting the powers that be even if it came at a cost.  We were brought up believing that our opinion does matter.  We carried the flare.  We wanted our country to be better.    

Living the 80s for us young people was one hell of an experience. 

Can't forget the innumerable times we drove around trucks and buses to go to political meetings.  The clandestine private lessons that took place at my parents' home at the time when learning came at a (political) cost, the anxiety of my dad going to work and possibly having his car vandalized, the protests, the confrontation with the police thugs, the buying of an assortment of newspapers with nervousness.    

Aleks Farrugia a friend and colleague states that young people are not only the possessors of the 'official' symbols of the Party but the mainstay of it. 

I can't agree more. 

For example the tragic demise of two young persons, Karen Grech and Raymond Caruana, even if the contexts where somewhat different, became a figurative whimper towards national reconciliation - their untimely death brought about amend.

But it was the Zghazagh tan-Numri that as a young person had the greatest impact on my political formation and social configuration.  In our own way young people, most of which like me were kannoli bla krema, were at the centre of resistance against the Government of the 80s.  This movement was led by Joe Saliba and Peppi Azzopardi, among others, who ably choreographed 'a theatre of the oppressed cum Boal'.  The surreptitious codes on the newspapers, the secret locations, the civil disobedience, the chain calls - were absolutely outlandish.  The strength of mind, the fortitude and the stamina of the Zghazagh tan-Numri needs to be recreated in terms of a youth social movement.  The assembly, the encounter, the coming together were of overriding value and had a enormous influence on the young person's augmentation.

Even though I was relatively young, people my age were already highly engaged in the political sphere, in our own little way, not racketing only but also debating, discussing, having a go at each other 'for the principles we believed in. 

It was an exciting time, an occasion where being young was focused on being political. 

And politics did have a scope the same way it has latitude today.  And you know what, I don't think our minds are messed up because we were so involved politically!  Most of us have been able to be part of the story but also to be critical of it. 

That's why young people and their contests are important ingredients in understanding the obligations of citizenship and how deeply connected they need to be in everyday life.

The active participation of youth is a necessary precondition for civic renewal in the pursuit of more socially stable societies. 

It is mistaken that we interpret 'youth' as a sub-culture that is abusive, disinterested and does not contribute to society's development.

The active participation of young people in decisions and actions is at the heart of our pulsating communities in contributing towards a more democratic, inclusive and prosperous society. Chipping in the democratic life of any community is more than voting or standing for election - the process is crucial because citizenship is also about obligations towards the community. 

Politics helps young people develop self-confidence and successfully deal with significant life changes and challenges. It gives them a voice in the life of their schools, in their communities and in society at large. It facilitates and produces motivated and responsible young people who relate positively to each other.

That is why I will be following and supporting the Pulse-SDM contest, that is why I will keep sharing the narratives of activism and remonstration of young people, that is why I will use all the tools I have available to shout out that young people deserve to be heard, merit the space, are worthy to rough copy our communities.

Andrew Azzopardi presents Ghandi xi Nghid and lectures at the University of Malta