Youth Congress 0f SDA ends

Acherensua (B/A) Jan. 2 GNA - Mr. Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, Deputy Brong-Ahafo Regional Minister on Friday said the Government was determined to give the youth the necessary attention to enable them to become disciplined, respectable and dedicated citizens. Mr. Baffour-Awuah said this at the close of the second quadrennial youth congress Mid-West Ghana Conference of Seventh Day Adventist at Acherensua in Asutifi South of Brong-Ahafo.

The nine-day congress was under the theme, "United In Witness of Truth - A Disciplined Youth".

A total of 420 youth and 20 pastors, selected from three sectors under the Conference, namely Sunyani, Dormaa and Kintampo, attended. Mr. Baffour-Awuah said the youth was the most active part of the human resource of any nation and Ghana's estimated youth, who form about 26 percent of its active population, also constituted the nation's greatest portion of untapped energies and talents.

On the theme of the congress, Mr. Baffour-Awuah noted that indiscipline had in recent years assumed the centre stage of national agenda of moral regeneration and economic development.

"There is indiscipline in our schools, especially in second cycle and tertiary institutions, on our roads, at our workplaces, in our homes and in our communities", he said, noting that the high incidence of hard drug use and trafficking, prostitution, rape, suicide and armed robbery were a manifestation of the moral decadence in the country.

The Deputy Minister stressed that the government was determined to uproot indiscipline of all forms from national life and asked the youth to consider the huge investment that the government was making on them especially in the education sector, by eschewing anti-social vices and leading decent and moral upright lives He urged parents and guardians to take keen interest in the lives of their children so they would not go wayward.

Mr. Baffour-Awuah tasked churches and other religious and faith-based organizations and associations to support government's efforts in fighting for the regeneration of moral values in the youth and the restoration of truth, morality, peace and tranquility in the society. "It is also imperative for religious leaders to include HIV/AIDS education in the fight against indiscipline through the formation of peer education groups, counseling units and access to information on the pandemic", he added.

He advised the youth of the church to see their youthful days as a preparatory period for the important role they were expected to play in nation-building.

The Deputy Minister expressed the hope that "no matter the change in technology, the Word of God still stands supreme" and urged churches to help use the Bible to change the lives of the youth. In a sermon, Pastor James Kwaku Baah, President of the Mid West Conference said the generation of indiscipline in the country was the fruit of the bad seed sown years ago.

He attributed the situation to "the indiscipline of compromise on the part of the citizenry", saying genuine Christians would always maintain the Biblical obedience in life no matter the interpretation of constitutional rights.

In a welcoming address, Pastor Ebenezer Mensah Aborampah, Youth Leader and Chaplaincy Director of the Conference said the campers were taught about self-esteem, how to manage business, time arrangement, selecting courses, youth education, health education, among others.