The Executive Director of the National Service Secretariat (NSS) has refuted claims that there are no job opportunities in the country for the youth.
Dr Kpessa Whyte says contrary to claims being peddled by the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) of how hopeless the country is growing, “there are several opportunities littering in Ghana.”
“We need to admit that the youth development is one thing that is important to this government. Government has approached the issue of unemployment in a multifaceted way by giving incentive to businesses to expand,” he told Dzifa Bampoe, host of Joy FM’s Top Story programme, Thursday.
NPP has accused government of dimming the future of Ghanaian youth with several unpopular policies in the country.
At a youth forum held at Agbogbloshie, a suburb of Accra, the National Youth Organiser of NPP, Sammy Awuku, said the challenges facing the country are registered on the faces of the youth.
According to him, the youth can no longer afford to leave the nation in the hands of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC).
He believes, “This year and in this election, it is about the scrap dealer who cannot make ends meet and the biggest celebrity we will need in this election is the Ghanaian youth.”
He said an NPP government will “scrap the new taxes on private universities that Mahama has introduced” which he believes amounts to a “tax on knowledge.”
Mr Awuku encouraged the youth to come out in their numbers in the upcoming election to push the interest of the NPP flagbearer, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
But Mr Whyte says the Mahama-led government has been doing all the things the NPP intends to do.
The government has shown the “pathways” in the areas of the Youth Enterprise Support (YES), Microfinance and Small Loans Centre (MASLOC) – which offers attractive financial packages and the rural enterprise support and the Rural Enterprise Support (RES) which is helping Ghanaians with skill acquisition.
These initiatives of the government, he said are helping the youth to develop entrepreneurial capabilities and also enhancing their own employability potentials.
“For a government that provides incentives to support private companies to grow deserves to be supported,” he said, adding, the youth are being prepared for the transition from student to the work environment.
He, however, said it is important as a country to “work on having a database on employment so that any argument will not be sentimental, but rather based on fact.”
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