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Hon. Solomon Bamola Gowin, is the national organising secretary, All-Youth Association of Nigeria (AYAN) and a member of National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN). He is presently the Author and Coordinator of “Rural Empowerment Advocacy Project (REAP)” an organisation dedicated to supporting Rural Youths in Enterprise Skills Development. In this interview with John Oba, he says he will strive to bring issues of youth development to the front burner. Excerpts:

AS AN ASPIRING PDP NATIONAL YOUTH LEADER, CAN YOU DO A BRIEF ASSESSMENT OF YOUR PARTY IN YOUTH DEVELOPMENT/EMPOWERMENT SINCE INCEPTION OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNANCE?

Well, the beauty of democracy is the opportunity to express oneself, opportunity to vote and to be voted. The cardinal essence of democracy is service at any level of governance and so it is, therefore, heartwarming for one to summon the courage to aspire to serve. As a loyal member of the party and aspiring PDP National youth leader, I have come to realise the fact that issues concerning the wellbeing of Nigerian Youths have been properly articulated by the founding leaders of our great party from inception. This is contained in the party’s manifesto at the formative stage and we are all living witnesses to efforts made so far and achievements recorded in this direction till date.

Our party place serious emphasis on matters affecting the youth and this is the reason why the PDP led government since the inception of the democratic governance instituted and consolidated various steps to address youth concerns, most especially as it affect their physical, emotional, cognitive, and psychological wellbeing. The creation of the Federal Ministry of Youth development; the laudable designing and subsequent implementation of a workable National Youth policy with special focus on youth employment and engagement; deliberate efforts to involve youths in governance and in decision making process; efforts to resolve the leadership crisis in the National Youth Council of Nigeria are some of the deliberate steps taking by the PDP government to address Youth concerns in Nigeria and I think this is quite commendable.

The newly instituted Youth Enterprise with innovation in Nigerian (YOUWIN) of the present administration has created more opportunities for the highly creative youths to get start up grants to establish businesses that will further create and generate more employment. Don’t also forget that agencies like SMEDAN, NERFUND, NDE, NAPEP are youth based and have also been properly positioned to serve the youth more productively even though there are always room for improvement as we progress as a democratic nation.

I quite agree that we need to place more emphasis on developing more result oriented strategies to deal with the issue of quality education at all levels where enterprise education will boost our capacity to effectively address and deal with the rising rate of unemployment among the youths and to impact positive civil and citizenship orientation on them. We must also note that government alone cannot do everything; other stakeholders like the private sector, NGOs, business community, religious organisations etc all have critical role to play in the development of the Nigerian youth to a desired standard of behaviour and empowerment. It is on this premise that I also wish to be privileged to pursue this aspiration as it relates to youth empowerment in this regard and this is the reason for offering myself for this great task at this time.

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WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR THE NIGERIAN YOUTH?

As I said earlier, my party has set youth concerns as priority and it is in line with this that I have also articulated my vision around the aspirations of our party in realisation of the overall objective of propelling the youth of this country to greatness. The concept of my vision is called, Rural Empowerment Advocay Project (REAP) and it is coined to directly relate to my commitment to avail the youths, most especially in the rural communities the opportunity and benefits of government actions and steps taken to address some of the basic concerns of the youth. On the other hand, project REAP is to serve as the platform for youth active participation in enterprise development activities with special focus on community catchment area comparative advantage. By implications, project REAP will be localised and will serve as the channels through which special attention will be focused on bringing government empowerment programs to the grassroots where majority of our youth population reside.

Let me also inform you that the project places special attention on enterprise promotion through marketable skills development; participation of youth in governance at the local levels, effective dissemination of information on government activities, strengthening of the National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN) and National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS). Also, provisions of startup capital for youths in support of their business ventures in the rural community and campaign for participation of leadership roles for youth leaders in continental and international youth organisations are also very imperative to the project. The overall essence of this is to ensure that the crisis of youth unemployment will be properly reduced. I am, therefore, determined more than ever to place issues of youth empowerment on the front burner and to ensure that the party is fully engaged and carried along in the entire process of implementing the REAP project.

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AS THE YOUTH LEADERS OF THE LARGEST AND RULING PARTY, HOW WOULD YOU DRIVE THE YOUTH AGENDA OF THIS ADMINISTRATION?

On driving the agenda of this administration, my priority is to ensure the replication of my vision in all the states and at the local levels where efforts of government in empowering the youth will be properly propagated to make the right impact. The challenge facing most youths in the rural areas is the access to these opportunities and information, project REAP will therefore strive to ensure that these group of persons at the local levels is carried along to benefit from government plans and actions in this regard. A vital aspect of this project is to also promote states and local initiatives for the empowerment of youths and to ensure that no community is left out. In other words, REAP will partner with both the states and local government, and the private sector to serve as a vehicle through which programs can reach the desired target of youths, most especially the vulnerable ones in the rural areas. Through the REAP project, programs of the Youth Ministry, Education, ICT Ministry, commerce and investment, SMEDAN, NAPEP, MDGs, NDE, housing, environment, health, international donor agencies etc will be propagated at the rural community level.

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GOING BY THE RECENT DELIBERATE GOVERNMENT DECISION TO REMOVE THE SUBSIDY LATER IN THE YEAR, DON’T YOU THINK THIS WILL HAVE NEGATIVE IMPACT ON YOUR PROPOSED REAP PROJECT AND ON THE YOUTH GENERALLY?

First of all, let me state that the recent subsidy agitations did not result to any looser or winner. Both government and the people only displayed their democratic tendencies as stakeholders in the political and economic system. While government was magnanimous to rescind on its decision to remove the subsidy totally, the people also realise the fact that going by some of the revelations of the shady deals within the oil sector, removal of the subsidy would address leakages and infrastructural deficits thereby creating more economic benefits like employment and associated empowerment goodwill. Government too have also realised the fact that effective communication and engagement of stakeholders will always be necessary before taking any actions that may have temporary negative impact on the people. On the impact of the subsidy removal on project REAP, I can assure you that the impact will be mitigated through supportive devices that has been built in it and which will be supported by private sector stakeholders, NGOs and different tiers of government at the federal, states, and local levels. It may interest you to note that the participation of youth in SURE programs has been secured and this will be fully implemented as soon as God grants us the privilege to become the National youth leader of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).