Onesmus Embula
WINDHOEK – Miss Namibia, Selma Kamanya, says the prestigious title has poised her to support causes close to her heart such as art and women empowerment.
“Art is one of the subjects I believe has been relatively neglected in our current education system. Children who are creative do not have sufficient opportunities to harness and develop their creative ideas. This could be through music, fine art and other forms of creativity, including fashion, design and so forth,” said Kamanya. She spoke at the InnoNation Foundation Trust gala dinner last Thursday themed “The Great Send-off” to raise funds for her social programmes during her tenure. The funds raised are also for her participation in the Miss Universe beauty pageant in Bangkok, Thailand on December 16, hence the theme of the gala dinner. She urged youngsters to be prepared to take up leadership responsibilities in the future. “The youth should, therefore, refrain from negative social tendencies and excessive alcohol and drug abuse,” she cautioned.
As Miss Namibia, Kamanya is required to come up with several programmes of her own, focusing on specific social subjects that are dear to her heart. She thus chose youth economic empowerment and women education. “My main task will thus be to act as a voice that will be bringing aspects related to these two subjects into the mainstream of everyday conversation,” she explained. Moreover, she said she plan to assist the youth to empower themselves through art and education.
Additionally, she said, she will utilise her reign as Miss Namibia 2018 to place emphasis on how to bridge the link between art and youth economic empowerment. “This can happen with your support, influential business people, and with the assistance of the government as well as the general public, we should all pay attention and start supporting local arts as this can be a source of income for many,” she added
Kamanya also stressed the need for Namibians to adopt a Namibian-centred and Namibian-serving attitude towards its creative industries. “When you have an active and economically-enabled youth, you will reduce social ills such as teen pregnancy and suicide,” she noted, adding that an economically empowered youth will be able to improve their general health, nutrition, wellness and self-esteem. She concurred that the education of women is a progenitor for economic and cultural growth. “Women have been impacted, most severely, and most negatively by the political turmoil that have characterised the African continent throughout the last century.”
However, she promised that her role as Miss Namibia 2018 will place focus on the promotion of commercial education for women. “As an economics student myself, I would like to see women getting involved in the shaping of the economic and civil realities of our African society,” she encouraged.