Decentralize presidential pitch initiative

In Ghana, various institutions have been promulgated over the years to create job avenues for the teeming masses. These include the youth employment program, cocoa mass spraying and planting for food and job.

Young people have become targets of extremist organizations which prey on their vulnerability and recruit them to engage in violent activities. Today unemployment has become a global challenge. In the third world economies, high unemployment levels have become a threat to state security and the survival of such nations.

On the assumption of office of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government, various institutions have been introduced. Most that stand tall to me as a youth is the Presidential Pitch Initiative which seeks to give young Ghanaians the opportunity to receive funding to implement their dream business ideas.

This year, June 17, 2020, saw the launch of season three of the annual presidential pitch competition for the youth. The initiative is solely a contest of business marketable ideas opened to young Ghanaian youth between the ages of 18 and 35 years.

This is aimed at realizing the government's ambition of helping to unleash an entrepreneurial revolution in the country. It is a revealing fact that the initiative if handled well will go a long way to reduce the unemployment rate in the country by supporting young business entrepreneurs with funding to boost their businesses for job creation and by extension bridge the poverty gap.

For me as a developing nation, job creation for the teeming youth must be a priority. We have not forgotten about the formation of the unemployed graduates association a few years back. As a nation, we must be able to create jobs for our citizens. Without it, we are bound to face serious social vices including a high crime rate, prostitution and social strife.

I, therefore, commend the presidential pitch initiative and the ministry of business development to firstly decentralize this initiative to encourage our rural folks with such a high intelligent quotient. Secondly, advice the ministry not to insist on complex and voluminous business plans from applicants for the pitching.

Above all, the Akans say, "Agoro ne fam" to wit, the true game is on the pitch. The aim is to assist the youth to build businesses that will ultimately be able to compete and create a job.

I will entreat my fellow Ghanaian youth to up the challenge and apply the annual pitch initiative with their simple basic business ideas which if discussed meets all the four-point business plan criteria of feasibility, innovation, scalability and employability. While applauding this brilliant initiative, I am hopefully hopeful that the program will be strictly monitored and evaluated from time to time and reviewed accordingly to ensure its sustainability through legislation, national progress, the standard of living and well being of the masses.

Your excellency, please decentralize this laudable initiative, legislate it to stand the test of time and ensure free and fairness in its dispatch.