Minister admits failures

Kyebi (ER), April 12, 2006, GNA - Minister for Communication Albert Kan Dapaah, has admitted that the government's initial youth employment package flopped, but denied that the failure amounted to deceit of the people.

"Government did not design to engage in any form of deceit when it embarked upon the ambitious drive to help draft many unemployed youth into gainful jobs in spite of the fact that the initiative floundered," Mr Kan-Dapaah reiterated.

The Communication Minister was responding to concerns raised by a contributor at the East Akyem District version of People's Assembly held at Kyebi on Tuesday.

The contributor held that the announcement by the government to the effect that new jobs were to be created for the youth based mass registration, turned out to be a hoax.

Mr Kan-Dapaah argued that the failures did not mean that government was taking the people for a ride, adding that a new 'Youth Employment programme' was designed to generate some 500 jobs for the youth in each district.

He stated that unlike other youth projects, the government had budgeted over four trillion cedis for the initiative, adding that some efforts had been made to ensure that the proposed project did not suffer from cash problems.

Mr Kan-Dapaah said governments could not offer employments to all their citizenry hence the need for the individuals themselves to take advantage of prevailing state policies.

"We cannot offer full employment in Ghana because that cannot happen, and it has never happened in any country", said the Minister, who is also Member of Parliament for Afigya Sekyere.

Mr Kan-Dapaah also agreed with another contributor that teachers deserved a better remuneration, but explained that efforts to improve upon their package did not work out as a result of serious financial problems the NPP inherited when it took office.