Bookself Mojatu.com Mojatu Nottingham Magazine M028 | Page 39

Nottingham connected Business & Finance FEARLESS YOUTH ASSOCIATION By John Gordon An organisation called Fearless Youth Association have received £15000 from the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) Paddy Tipping as part of his community budget to help fight crime. FYA is a partner organisation to Mojatu, the charity I volunteer for. FYA is a local charity set up by a group of primarily black youths to fight crime in particular knife crime in their communities. The message is mainly spread through music, debate, fashion show and a pop-up radio station. This money gives FYA a budget for a year to promote their vision and to rent a safe space where they can gather away from the threat they face on a daily basis in their local area. There they can participate in activities like making music which is rewarding. Knife crime is growing at an alarming rate not just in London but also in the poorer boroughs of Nottingham.  The great tragedy is the more incidents we have the more people carry knives for protection. The great thing about this grant is it brings FYA and other youth closer to the police. These communities have real distrust of the police for historic reasons and with some justification as the Stephen Lawrence case shows. I know from my time at the Police that it is a different organisation from 20 years ago. I have written this partly to let you know about FYA and the work it does but more importantly to let you know that  in the communities where knife crime is most prevalent the local community is fighting this. We always read the bad side but very rarely the positive. I am worried that the crass incompetence of Windrush and the appalling anti-Semitic attacks on the left of the Labour Party will increase the suspicion our Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) communities have of us. I have always hated racism but that is easy in a Dorset village where 99% of the population is white middle class. It is only since I have worked at Mojatu that I have seen the talent fyaonline.com in these communities and their potential even if I still fya_notts cannot tell one rap track from Fya Notts another. If you have got to the end thanks for reading FYA_Notts Contact Number: 01157846670 Esther 07490037643 39