The excesses of political propaganda on job creation and employment over the years have been a sole drawback in Ghana’s attempt to secure economic redemption and financial emancipation for institutions and individuals.
Instead of rolling out a comprehensive policy document or a national plan dealing with the surging unemployment situation in Ghana, we’ve rather reduced policies on unemployment and discussions to partisan debates as the blame games continue.
Per the data released 2015 via World Economic Forum by International Labor Organization (ILO) on global youth unemployment situation posited global unemployment rate at a staggering 13.1 percent, that is a clear admission that youth unemployment is a challenge even in developed economies.
In Ghana if you consider the mushrooming youth population and the growing mismatch between non skill oriented youth and the requirements for jobs available, it explains the spiraling surge in youth unemployment situation here in Ghana.
Over the years, as a country we have failed to roll out sustainable employment avenue to absorb the teaming jobless youth, many who have turned themselves into anti-social gang groups terrorizing Innocent souls through gun point robbery, our city streets are choked with countless number of frustrated youth population seeking non-existent jobs to quash their frustration.
All policy drafts on solving this social canker have appeared to be party-woven stories and statements with no proper plan of solving the unemployment problem.
The National service modulo has failed to achieve the purpose for its establishment, same is the YEA and the NYEP, the recent NABCO modulo is set to follow same trend, each of them is a political creation or party fury tale to score political points without critically assessing the real situation on ground. GEEDA modulo became the job of the century, MASLOC is another joke in the making, an avenue where monies are shared among party supporters, family and friends, looking at how tainted these avenues are with partisan indentations, people who often get employed are party fanatics who see the job as a reward for their partisan advocacies therefore they become reticent in helping to achieve the purpose for such establishment.
Let’s focus on this recent NABCO scheme, admittedly the idea is good because in other jurisdictions, such stop gap schemes were successful in addressing economic recessions in countries like Germany, UK and USA sometime ago.
In Ghana, fortunately for the Nana Addo led administration, the YEA, the NYPD modulo are still in play, so there’s no need to roll out another scheme which obviously is going to have financial problems.
If we want to focus on employing graduates, within the YEA scheme, we can create an avenue for graduates to be employed; we don’t need another service scheme that’s going to be cost effective on administrative lines alone. But because our inclination has always been party oriented, governments always prefer creating their own legacy to be remembered for, which is a very bad.
The begging questions on this scheme is simple, what is the level of stakeholders engagement, what is the source of funding, how sustainable is the scheme , is there any definitive roadmap or policy documents on this and what are the assurances that even those who subscribe will genuinely receive their monthly stipends. The already exiting schemes have had their own challenges and still facing a lot of challenges, the YEA is saddled with salaries arrears of subscribers so what is the guarantee that NABCO isn’t going be of similar fate.
The inclusion of a profession group, nurses make the program laughable, it’s the integrity of a professional group government is attempting to flash off in their bid to dodge the challenging unemployment situation facing us.
They told us, the module was about value addition to graduates in a bid to bridge the gap between academia and the corporate world, so what addition is the scheme going to offer to an already made nurse? When indeed their colleagues who are already employed receive good stipends, under this scheme graduates nurses are going to take LESS THAN HALF of salaries their colleagues take. Remember they are going to same facility to work, run same shift and expose to same risk.
I think paying nurses 700 cedis under this modulo is a big joke.
If government is committed to solving this impasse, nurses should be given a special package, they deserve a special treat, because of the special role they offer and the rigorous training they’ve acquired.
I expect the toothless and non-bucking bulldog, the GRMNA, to rise to the occasion and resist any attempt by government to cow them into employment slavery, nurses deserve better.
Providing temporal jobs are not a solution to the desperate youth unemployment situation at hand, we must figure what the real problems are.
First we must change our educational system, there’s a need to design curriculum that has direct link with the job market so graduates can slip into employment after graduation either in the private sector or public sector.
We also need to implement policies that will aid economic growth so that the private sector can also create an industrial sector for employment.
We can achieve this through lowering of taxes, stop the over-regulating of industries, stop playing favorites and also stop putting monies into unsustainable schemes like the NABCO, the YEA and others.
Over the years the financial malfeasance, corruption and collisions that have bedeviled these schemes and monies wasted alone could be more than enough to cater for new 100 thousand entrants into the public sector, the wanton dissipation Of State resources must end now. Let’s invest in our youth and tap into their intellectual ingenuity to build an industrious society. The bile is my witness.
Ivan Kyei Innocent|ahotoronline.com|Ghana
