The National Youth Authority (NYA) is urging corporate Ghana to devote substantial amount of their budget to support the NYA scale up its National Youth Volunteer programmes as part of its Corporate Social Responsibilities (CSR).
According to the NYA, the amount of monies spent by these entities to sponsor beauty pageants and musical concerts can equally be channelled into constructing school buildings, CHPS compounds and water projects for people in deprived communities.
In an interview with Citi News on the sidelines of the handing over of the Abome DA primary school which was renovated by youth volunteers to the community in the Asuogyaman District of the Eastern Region, the CEO of the National Youth Authority, Puis Enam Hadzide charged corporate Ghana to get involved in the resolution of some of the challenges in rural communities.
“It is very important that we are estimating that we are constructing this facility at least one-sixth. We have saved a lot of money by deploying this strategy of using volunteers. The estimated cost of putting this project on the market for contractors to come and renovate to this standard, what we have spent in our view is equal to one-sixth of the total estimate.
“This is a very cost-effective way, this way we can build more facilities. We are asking for support, especially from corporate Ghana. We are excited that they spend some of their monies on musical concerts, beauty pageants it’s ok. But as important as it is, we believe that a little attention on the infrastructure module of the national volunteer programme will even be of more benefit to our various communities. We are the ones who patronise their products, goods and services,” he appealed.
The headteacher of the Abome DA primary school Edith Nyahomeh bemoaned open defecation by residents which was affecting effective teaching and learning in the school.
She expressed appreciation to the National Youth Authority for the kind gesture assuring that learning and teaching will be improved.
“Due to lack of doors, we had to pack teachers’ chairs and tables, veronica buckets to the store room. We had to pack our chairs and desks to the KG block during vacations, which was disturbing us because we kept spending money on repairs. And it was affecting teaching and learning in the school. Open defecation has been affecting us. They were moving from classroom to classroom and smearing it on our drawers. We were cleaning every now and then. It affected us in the 2021 academic year. Now that they have fenced the school wall, we promise that there will be improvement in learning and teaching in the school,” he indicated.