It is critically important for grown up people to continue to point our children and youth in the right direction.

Our country needs young people with a sound mind and purpose in life and it is the role of adults to show them the way as role models. We have a youth bulge, and so many of them are out there with in our society with no sense of purpose in life. They need direction from adults, especially by those in positions of leadership and authority.

There are times the youth hear the wise counsel of adults in positions of leadership and authority in all strata of society from the family up to the high echelons in Papua New Guinea. Parents and older siblings constantly remind the younger ones about proper conduct and appropriate ways of living.

The end-of-year graduation ceremonies in different levels of education are often times when grand speeches are delivered to the young people graduating. The educational institutions often pick persons in authority whom they consider as having acumens of being role models to deliver the graduation speeches.

In these grand speeches in graduation ceremonies and other arenas, the adults point their young audience to sports stars, high achievers in various fields and even famous characters in the Bible, as role models to emulate.

Great tales are told about the achievements of these role models. The wise words coming from the “experienced” adults in leadership and other positions of authority leave the young audience mesmerized.The young minds are left with all sorts of questions about the kinds of role models they would emulate in life.

After a while, the young people hear bad stories about those in leadership positions, who may have delivered a grand counsel about great “role models” in a graduation ceremony, ending up in the wrong side of the law and being a bad role model.

There is a now a growing army of bad role models in our country. It is very troubling to realise our society has many individuals who circumvent the norm or what is right by law and our value systems to achieve whatever they want. Morals and ethics, our Christian and customary values no longer stand in the ways of these kinds of persons who just want to do the wrong thing and “achieve” their objectives, particularly wealth.

The mainstream media spaces and social media posts plus private discussion groups these days constantly feature stories of bad role models in our midst.

The mainstream and social media are feeding the young a constant diet of reports about persons in positions of leadership and authority from the family level up to the highest echelons getting in the wrong side of the law or the value systems of our country.

Some of us grew up as children and youth in another era, where much of the bad role modelling we see and hear among the adults hardly existed. There were one or two incidents of bad role modelling by an adult, and that was it.

Back then, adults in positions of authority tended to live by our values, whether they be Christian values or traditional values, and respected the rule of law and the norms of organisations.

It is a different story nowadays. Our value systems, norms and the rule of law seems nothing to the growing population of bad adult role models out there. There are individual adults who want to get what they want with no regard for our value systems, rule of law and norms of organisations. They make no bones about their conduct or feel remorseful about their actions. When some of them, especially those in high places, are caught or accused of a wrongdoing, they are quick to be on the defensive. They rush to their lawyers to defend them even to the extent of threatening to pursue defamation proceedings in the court to “protect my name”. In saying that, the highflyers accuse the investigators, complainants and even the media for destroying their reputations for accusations they claim are false. They enable their lawyers and connections as highflyers to go on over-drive to undermine the claims made or investigations to ensure it is delayed, suppressed and eventually die out.

There is one issue we must have for these sort of bad role models in the high echelons of our society. If they are not guilty as they claim, why not allow the investigative processes or court proceedings regarding the claims proceed and let those due processes clear their names and restore their reputations? Why go on a counter-media trial and accuse the complainants, investigators and the media for destroying their reputations? Why use all sorts delay tactics available in our legal system to drag on the case? Yes, it is their constitutional rights to defend themselves but to use legally available means to wrongly delays cases does not help our society and their standing.

What these sorts of leaders in high places do not realise is the bad role models they become to the young people in the community and in the various levels of education.

I wonder what goes on in the minds of the children and young relatives of these sorts of bad role models in our society. I mean there is a growing number of adults in positions of leadership and authority that are accused of doing the wrong things and how do they feel about the kinds of bad role models they are with their actions.

My point is if you are an adult in a position of leadership and authority that demands your children and the youths to become better persons, well you better practice what you preach.