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The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) appears to have abandoned Ghanaian youth to their fate as the party says it will not participate in the International Youth Day (IYD) Celebrations.

The NDC thinks there is nothing to celebrate and feels the youth need not participate in the International Day celebration which is recognized worldwide.

According to the Youth Wing of the NDC, the only thing that is worth celebrating is the tenacity, resilience, and the tolerance of youth in the face of extreme unjustifiable provocation.

International Youth Day is an awareness day designated by the United Nations. The purpose of the day is to draw attention to a given set of cultural and legal issues surrounding youth. The first IYD was observed on 12 August, 2000

The Assembly recommended that public information activities be organized to support the Day as a way to promote better awareness of the World Programme of Action for Youth, adopted by the General Assembly in 1995 (resolution 50/81). International Youth Day is commemorated every year on 12 August.

Locally, NYA has unveiled series of activities to commemorate this year’s International Youth Day celebrations.

Part of the series of activities is to confer the Star of the Youth of Ghana Award on President Akufo-Addo in recognition of his exemplary leadership and the numerous interventions that create a conducive atmosphere for the youth to develop and thrive.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Authority, Pius Enam Hadzide said this at the official unveiling of activities to mark this year’s celebrations at a press conference in Accra on Tuesday mentioned that the event will be held from 10th to 12th August 2022, at the Anagkazo Bible and Ministry Training Center – Akwapim Mampong.

The celebrations would be under the theme; “Intergenerational Solidarity: Creating a World for all Ages’’ and would highlight the need to foster solidarity across generations in the pursuit of building the future. The celebration is to raise awareness of the barriers which hamper intergenerational solidarity and impede the creation of an age-inclusive world where no one is left behind.

Shockingly, the youth wing of the main opposition political party, NDC has expressed contrary view about the youth as it has asked the youth of the party not to participate in the International event.

In a statement released and signed by George Opare Addo, National Youth Organizer of the party the NDC was of the view that there is absolutely nothing for the youth to celebrate “in these times of excruciating hardship that the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia government has brought upon the Ghanaian youth through their bad governance, economic mismanagement, and pervasive corruption.

“The hardship is so dire that the youth struggle to afford one decent meal a day. To add insult to injury, prices of goods and services keep on increasing on the market every second.”

It added that “Contrary to the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia government’s fanciful promises to create descent jobs for the youth, they have rather increased the unemployment situation through the collapse of businesses such as banks and other financial institutions resulting in the laying-off of many of our youth. Many graduates, newly trained nurses, teachers, and other professionals remain at home unemployed and wonder where their next meal will come from. Those in the informal sector already struggling to put body and soul together have been saddled with unbearable taxes to further worsen their precarious living standards.”

He alleged that the youth in the country are asked to pay money before they are recruited into the security services.

“The NPP government has thrown meritocracy to the dogs! No wonder there are concerns about standards of professionalism in some of our security agencies today.

“The economic mismanagement by the government has resulted in extremely bad times for young entrepreneurs who struggle to make ends meet due to increase in taxes, and nuisance taxes such as the e-levy which has led to the deliberate collapse of the mobile money businesses affecting the livelihoods of over 300,000 youth. Most young people who were into online business have had to fold up due to the introduction of the roundly condemned e-levy.”

The NDC youth organiser described NaBCO as anti-youth programme as well National Service Scheme (NSS).

“As the NDC rightly predicted, the NaBCO model for job creation is unsustainable. After putting NaBCO beneficiaries through months of hardship by government’s refusal to pay them their meagre allowances, government has finally collapsed the programme and the beneficiaries are now hopeless! Ominously, the Akufo Addo/Bawumia government has wickedly failed to pay beneficiaries their monthly stipends for the past nine months.

“Another disturbing anti-youth project this government is vigorously pursuing, is its inability to pay allowances of national service personnel for many months now. The case of teacher and nursing trainee allowances is not different. After bragging of supposedly restoring trainee allowance to enhance its electoral fortunes, government has so far not been able to honor its promise.

“While government cannot find money to pay these allowances to give respite to young people, President Akufo-Addo finds money to rent luxurious jets at cut-throat prices at the detriment of suffering taxpayers so he can enjoy bathing in the sky,” according to Pablo.

He said though the Free SHS programme which has been lauded by many Ghanaians as a good programme, has brought untold hardships to parents and students, saying that the boarding students are dying of hunger in schools and they are largely relying on the benevolence of their old school associations, churches, and philanthropists to survive.

The NDC Youth Organiser noted that the state of the Ghanaian youth today under this government is hopelessness and complete disillusionment because the government is clueless about youth development and how to address the challenges facing the youth.

He was therefore surprised that the NYA is readying itself to mark this year’s international youth day instead of charging government to immediately address the needs of the youth.

“We are aware that the NYA intends to mark the day by conferring an award on President Akufo-Addo. That is nothing but an insult to the Ghanaian youth. It is such a wonder that at a time that the Ghanaian youth are struggling, the NYA finds it necessary to award the President for inflicting hardship on them,” he mentioned.

According to him, the youth during the regime of NDC under President John Mahama handed over a National Youth Policy and Implementation Plan to the Akufo-Addo government 6 years ago but the current government failed to implement the policy than reviewing the policy.

“Again, the NDC government enacted the National Youth Authority Act in 2016 but the Akufo-Addo government has failed to implement the law for the benefit of the Ghanaian youth,” Opare Addo stated.

He believes there is absolutely no future for the youth under the Akufo-Addo government.