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President Koroma rolls out major youth empowerment project and policy

26 February 2016 at 10:06 | 1138 views

PV Staff

A State House Communications Unit report states that various projects have been designed by the government to provide job opportunities for young people as well as improve their livelihoods in riverine and coastal fishing communities.

The report, dated Thursday February 25 ,added that President Ernest Bai Koroma officially launched the Youth in Fishing project and the Revised National Youth Policy 2014 at the Tambercular Wharf in Aberdeen, west of Freetown the capital on Thursday morning. The launching itself was preceded by singing and dancing by enthusiastic youths in the area.

Sierra Leone has a largely youthful population with many of them lacking the education, training and skills for the modern job market. Many come from poor homes where getting three square meals a day is a huge problem not to talk of affording quality education.

President Koroma and Youth Affairs Minister Alimamy Kamara displaying an illustration of the new Youth Policy.

The president, the SHCU report went on, recalled that he established the Ministry of Youth Affairs with the mandate to give leadership and to inject a sense of urgency in addressing the challenges facing the youth.

Cutting of the tape to launch the historic project and policy.

President Koroma, the report continued, pointed out that government has taken several actions in this direction which include putting together a revised National Youth Policy, enacting the National Youth Commission Act, developing the Youth Development Programme, passing the National Youth Service Act (which will involve the country’s graduates in the development of the country), commencing the National Youth Village Project in Koinadugu district, and expanding the Youth in Drainage Clearing Project among others.

President Koroma being greeted by Fisheries Minister Pat-Sowe on arrival.

The Revised National Youth Policy, according to President Koroma, would serve as "the blueprint for the empowerment of young people in key strategic areas including Youth Sensitive Policy Analysis, Education and Skills Development, Agriculture, Health and Healthy Lifestyles, Technology and Innovation, Socio-economic Integration of Youth, Protection of the Environment, Sustainable Livelihoods and Youth Employment."

Fishing boats and engines to be distributed to youths in fishing communities.

These are all very laudable plans which, if successfully implemented would go a long way in alleviating the plight of hundreds of thousands of needy young people around the country badly in need of the skills and opportunities that will lift them from abject poverty and make them productive citizens.

On the other hand, the SHCU report noted, the Youth in Fishing Project is intended to make more fish available in local markets and at affordable cost.This is very important in a country where wages and salaries are some of the lowest in the world.

"That is why the project has constructed boats outfitted with 70 Horse power engines. These boats will be distributed across 70 fishing communities nationwide, targeting at least 1,000 youth. And this is just the first phase of a total of 200 Outboard Fishing Boats to be provided by mid 2017, the president said amid rapturous applause," the SHCU reported.

The president then thanked the Alwaleed Foundation from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for providing part of the funds for the project and promised government’s commitment to continue to work with development partners and to implement development projects that will provide not just skills training but also job opportunities for young people.

The report went on:

"President Koroma urged beneficiaries (of the first phase of the project) to make good use of the opportunity, to improve their lives and those of their families and create opportunities for others and contribute to the socio-economic development of the country. But you must also ensure sustainable fishing by using appropriate fishing nets, he admonished."

One of the state officials behind this initiative is the Minister of Youth Affairs Honourable Alimamy Kamara who thanked President Koroma for his continued support to youth empowerment, noting that his ministry’s business is to implement youth empowerment projects.

Kamara, obviously proud of the work of his Ministry, praised development partners for their support to his ministry and observed that not all young people lack seriousness and that the beneficiaries are going to be trained by the Maritime Administration. He entreated them to prove to the nation that they are now changed people.

The Adviser on Youth Affairs in the Office of the Chief of Staff, Dr Sheku Gibril Kamara called on fishermen to make judicious use of the boats by managing them well and appealed for cooperation to move the project forward.

The Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources Captain (Rtd) Momodu Alieu Pat-Sowe, who is the APC party point man for the Western Region and a man very much involved in youth activities, described the project as an example of "inter-ministerial collaboration" to provide the required technical support to the Ministry of Youth Affairs.

Pat-Sowe told beneficiaries of this first phase to work closely with their communities and urged them to refrain from using monofilament as it destroys the fishes.

The Chairperson of the occasion, former Special Executive Assistant to President Koroma, Dr Sylvia Olayinka Blyden, also a youth activist of many years, recalled that President Koroma had pledged to support the youth of Sierra Leone since he was in opposition and during the campaign trail, he also vowed to commit his government to youth empowerment which he has "gone far in actualizing."

It seems the government of Sierra Leone is now in the implementation stage of of its plans for Sierra Leone’s youths or young adults; plans whose implementation was put on hold for many months as the government and the international community waged a relentless war on the Ebola Virus Disease that threatened to destroy the little that was left of the country after the devastating eleven-year civil war.

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