By Solomon Gumah
Tamale, Nov. 1, GNA – The government has been urged to reaffirm its commitment to the Northern Development Authority (NDA) by providing substantial financial and infrastructural support for its operations.
Mr Issaka Basit, Secretary of the Northern Regional Youth Network, who made the call, said out of the total financial requirement of more than $172.1 million needed for the implementation of the Medium-Term Development Strategy of the NDA under the Agenda for Rapid Transformation and Job Creation in northern Ghana, government’s commitment was only $57 million thus creating huge funding gap.
He said, “We request that government commit at least $86 million, representing 50 per cent of the total financial requirement of the NDA to ensure that vital projects and initiatives were executed in a timely and efficient manner to enhance youth development.”
He was presenting a communique on behalf of the Northern, Upper East, Upper West, North East, and Savannah Regional Youth Networks at the maiden Northern Ghana Youth Budget forum held in Tamale.
The communique also called on the government to increase its core funding allocation to the NDA to 300 million Ghana Cedis annually, aside the current funding arrangement, which it said was suffocating the NDA and making it ineffective.
The forum dubbed: “A Youth-Led Social Accountability and Advocacy Engagement with the Northern Development Authority”, was organised by YEFL-Ghana, an NGO, with funding support from Oxfam in Ghana amongst other partners.
It was to enable young people to comprehend the budgetary arrangements of the NDA, challenges, and the need to solicit government’s support to help implement its projects and programmes.
Mr Ganiyu Alhassan, Technical Advisor for Youth Advocacy and Gender at YEFL-Ghana, said the forum was also intended to put a lenses on the NDA on how they could collaborate to mobilise and strategically position the youth to support the NDA to achieve its mandate.
He said it was also to encourage youth participation in the development processes of the country and the need to demand accountable leadership.
He called on the NDA to prioritise shifting its focus from activity-based engagements to embarking on major infrastructure development that would guarantee the holistic development of the northern sector.
Mr Iddi Zakaria, Deputy Chief Executive Officer of NDA in-charge of Projects and Programmes, commended YEFL-Ghana and partners for the forum, saying the engagement would help to broaden the scope of its budgetary allocation.
He said the NDA had implemented about 1,800 projects in various locations in Northern Ghana, which included improving the delivery of social services, private sector investments, peace, and security, amongst others.
The communique would be presented to the various Regional Coordinating Councils, Office of Special Development Initiatives, Ministry of Finance, Parliament of Ghana, and the media.
GNA