Atta Mills And Ndc Have Really Failed Our Youth!!!!

The NDC’s manifesto made a clear vision to steer Ghana towards a better nation through a focus on youth care, development and employment.

Two Years in government their manifesto continues to remain mere words, empty slogans and wishful thinking.

Currently, Ghanaian youth are facing many problems ranging from being used as pawns in the promotion of tribalism, political violence, armed robbery, drug addiction and alcohol abuse due to lack of employment and opportunity. Their problems have further worsened due to lack of structural programmes to improve their conditions and an increase in a large number of our youths roaming the streets of our cities and towns with nothing to do.

The NDC deceptively made the youth of our country believe and buy into their so called “better Ghana” agenda which has turned out to be nothing but constant feeding of cock and bull stories to Ghanaians. Mr Okudzeto Ablakwa, Deputy Minister of information, came out with an outright lie that 1 million jobs had been created, a statement denied by ET Mensah, his own Minister of Employment.

The vast majority of the youth in Ghana are dejected and without hope and a sense of direction. The NDC government, barely over two years in government has reduced our youths to shamefully scrambling for

ownership and control of public toilets, markets places, and resorting to “Sakawa”, get rich quick at any cost or adopting a die trying attitude to make ends meet.

We should not be surprised at the NDC’s lack of policies to help the youths in Ghana. This is because historically, the party has never been interested in the handling of youth problems in Ghana. For example the Programme of Action to Mitigate the Social Cost of Adjustment (PAMSCAD) introduced by its predecessors the PNDC government was abandoned because it failed to address the needs of our youth. As a matter of fact the current NDC government continues to struggle with tens of thousand of registered unemployed youths across the country despite President Mills promising to put money in the pocket of our youth especially during his election campaign in the three northern regions, Upper East, Upper West and Northern Regions in 2008.

The NDC government has abandoned its election commitment to the youth of Ghana, they have failed to initiate, restructure or continue with major youth policies and programs (NYEP) initiated by the NPP government led by former president John Agyekum Kufuor.

It is very worrying that some of these youth oriented programs started by the Kufuor administration had either been grossly neglected or mismanaged to the detriment of the future progress of our youth.

It is sad and worrisome to note that the NYEP, initiated by the NPP to engage the services of the youth and garner their energy to develop our nation has been politicized by the NDC, with admission into the program now being purely based on political allegiance and almost at the point of collapse. It is desperately struggling for funds, direction and leadership

We believe it is time

1. The NYEP scheme is depoliticized and positioned as a major mobilization tool for youth development and to contribute to nation building.

2. The youth in Ghana are put at the heart of steering Ghana to a better nation by reviewing the National Youth Policy from its partisan biased posture to a truly national document for youth development which advocates for leadership, education for all, entrepreneurship, a can do attitude and healthy living.

3. To lift the freeze on public sector employment so that our young graduates who are sitting at home can be employed and the knowledge and skills acquired be used for the benefit of the nation. There are more than 265,000 of them sitting t home Mr Mills, what in Gods name are you doing to their future ?

President Atta Mills must stop the sermons and start getting our youth employed. Two years have already being wasted.

Nana Yaw Sarpong-07983302369