The Dean of the African Diplomatic corps, Madam Pavlin Musoka, says the assistance that the youth within Africa genuinely require is financial resources to facilitate networking within the confines of the African continent and establish joint venture business partnerships among themselves.
Madam Musoka said the networking could be between youth from Zimbabwe and Ghana in the different sectors such as Tourism, Agriculture and the Financial Services sectors of the economy.
She was speaking at the launch of the Euro-Africa Youth Parliament (EYP), in Accra on Monday.
The EYP programme is an outcome of the Youth Bridge Foundation’s (YBF’s) flagship project.
It is the African Youth and Governance Conference initiative and German-Ghanaian civil society collaboration between YBF and the European Youth Parliament which started in 2012 with exchanges.
Mad. Mukosa said the programme, would give ample time to finding solutions to the challenges of creation of employment for the youth in Africa and Europe as it was the youth themselves who could adequately address their own challenges, taking advantage of the ICT revolution.
“Gone are days when the Youth waited upon their parents or legal guardians to find jobs for them. The responsibility now rests upon no one other than the youth themselves through assistance from their peer groups and contacts on their social network mailing lists across the global village” she noted.
She called on governments on the African continent to collaborate with their European counterparts in finding a lasting solution to the migration of African youths from Africa to Europe by investing their financial resources into programmes that encouraged migration within the African continent.
She also stressed the need to encourage Africans in the Diaspora to return to mother Africa and assist African governments to achieve tangible results in employment creation for the benefit of African youths who might be tempted to migrate to the so called “Greener Pastures” overseas.
“The message you should bear in mind during your deliberations is that African youths should cease organizing themselves into groups that join the great trek, to the so called greener pastures” in Europe and abroad because their pastures are only green during the four-month Summer season from June to September in a year. You should instead seek greener pastures within the respective countries and within the African continent where the pastures are green almost throughout the year,” Mad. Mukosa said.
The German Ambassador to Ghana, Mr. Ruediger John, encouraged delegates who would attend the Euro-African Youth Parliament-Berlin 2014 to present ideas that the German government could incorporate into its new policy for Africa since the German government was changing its policy on Africa and was seeking partnerships with African countries.
Mr John noted that partnerships came with responsibility on the part of both partners for themselves and their future.
He tasked the delegates to not only address the common challenges facing the youth in both Africa and Europe, such as food security, climate change and the like, but also take time to make friends with their counterparts from other countries.
For his part, the Executive Director of YBF, Mr. Seth Oteng said the peer-to-peer partnership of YBF-EYP was the Foundation’s modest contribution towards developing a model in Africa as well as a great investment in the youth of both continents in promoting participatory governance for sustainable development.
He maintained that the challenges confronting youth of both continents in Europe or Africa today had great bearing on the future of Europe and Africa.
The first step in young people’s investment either in Europe or Africa, he said, was by investing in themselves.
“They must invest in their integral development, including their mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual dimensions, by pursuing their education, careers and personal growth. More than that, young people must invest in preserving a culture that values families,” Mr Oteng said.
He stressed the need to vote for leaders who would ensure that there were policies that took critical look at the well-being of the youth.
Source: ISD (Nana Ama Bonnah)
