The National Youth Service is a programme of the Zimbabwean government for Zimbabweans of ages 10 to 30. It was authorized by the 1979 National Service Act, passed by the government of Zimbabwe Rhodesia, and established in 2001 under the presidency of Robert Mugabe. Its stated purpose is to "transform and empower youths for nation building through life skills training and leadership development." The National Youth Service has been condemned in the West and in Africa for gross human rights violations on behalf of the ZANU-PF party. Within Zimbabwe the graduates of the service are known pejoratively as green bombers after the fatigue uniforms they wear and more recently as the Youth Brigade.
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Purpose
The service claims to instill in young Zimbabweans a sense of national identity and patriotism. While it proposes to unite people above party lines, it also promotes wariness of "foreign influence and intervention" in national politics. The opposing view, both inside Zimbabwe and abroad, holds that the service indoctrinates its members with absolute loyalty to ZANU-PF and trains them for military operations to enforce its dominance. The government plans to make the program mandatory for all youths.
Ideology
According to an opposition group, members of the youth service are taught exclusively from ZANU-PF campaign materials and speeches. These include an anthology of Mugabe's speeches titled Inside the Third Chimurenga. The speeches glorify Mugabe's land reform programme and ZANU-PF leaders Border Gezi and Chenjerai Hunzvi. They accuse the Movement for Democratic Change of seeking a return to white rule.
Training centres
Conditions in the service training facilities are reported to include poor construction, frequent hunger and sexual abuse of girls and women.