Participants of this year’s Northern Easter School in Wa have called on politicians of different party persuasions from the northern to strive to forge a united front to promote development of Northern Ghana. They should also organize peace-building and conflict resolution workshops and seminars in the communities perceived as trouble spots to sensitise the youth and politicians to be aware that development thrives on the environment of peaceful co-existence. In a communiqué, the participants urged policy makers to involve the youth on issues that affect them and motivate them to cherish their own personal social development, value self-respect and willingness to sacrifice their own lives for the good of others. The participants also called on government to review and promulgate a comprehensive National Youth Policy that would guide the mobilisation of the youth for national development. The communiqué identified access and equity in the provision of education in Northern Ghana as a major challenge that needed to be addressed urgently to help reduce the high illiteracy rate among the people and enhanced policies and programmes implementations. The participants appealed to the leadership in Northern Ghana to institute a “Northern Ghana Education Week” to be observed annually by all stakeholders in education to sensitise parents and guardians about the importance of lifelong learning to the personal advancement of their wards and the development of the north. The statement urged teaching and learning institutions to be innovative, proactive and develop short courses, sandwich and distance learning programmes relevant for the youth to advance in education to help propel the development agenda of the country forward. The communiqué advised traditional rulers and opinion leaders to take advantage of such programmes to enhance their understanding of development issues and to mobilise their people for development in their communities. The statement called on government and other benevolent organisations to support vulnerable groups with provision of credit facility and encouraged them to participate actively in lifelong education programmes to enable them to contribute meaningfully to society. “Policies and laws that have been enacted to enhance the progress and development of vulnerable groups in the Northern Ghana should be strictly implemented and enforced by the relevant agencies”, the communiqué added. On the environment, the participants suggested that communities must be encouraged to own and manage their natural environment, involved in the initiation and execution of environmental projects and be equally considered in the sharing of the benefits accruing from such projects. It called on gender activists and gender based organisations to include environmental education as part of their programmes to sensitise women on the need to preserve the environment. Source: GNA