The Deputy Majority Leader in Parliament, Alexander Afenyo Markin, is calling on Ghanaian youth to aspire to become entrepreneurs instead of looking for employment in the public sector.

To him, the guarantee for success rest on building sustainable businesses, capable of employing others to create sustainable wealth in the process.

Addressing an entrepreneurial seminar at Winneba in the Central Region, Mr. Afenyo-Markin said the disturbing levels of youth unemployment threatens national security, but, he is equally convinced empowering the youth with skills to be self-employed is the way to go.

‘Last week, I watched television news on the maiden job and career fair held in Accra by the National Youth Employment Agency. The sheer number of able-bodied young men and women who flooded the venue of the two-day event in desperate search for job opportunities was striking.”

“Weeks earlier, many of us here saw similar scenes on television and in the newspapers of so many thousands of young men and women inundating Ghana Army recruitment centres around our country, hoping for an opportunity to get enlisted in our Armed Forces. While the scenes mentioned above show that many of our purposeful youth crave to secure honest employment to become helpful men and women of our society tomorrow, it is a national challenge’ he said.

According to him, though the government through initiative like the Planting for Food and Jobs and others have created millions of jobs, the answer to the staggering youth unemployment does not lie in recruitment into the public sector, but a change in mindset.

‘The other side of the scenes mentioned earlier is that the mindset of many of our youth is to seek employment in government offices and receive monthly salaries instead of daring to be entrepreneurs, build sustainable businesses themselves, employ others and create sustainable wealth in the process. If you are one of such people, then I stand before you today to tell you that you need a new mindset! That new mindset must be deeply rooted in entrepreneurship”. “You must have a voracious appetite for it. It must drive you to become a millionaire or billionaire tomorrow through critical thinking, risk-taking, hard work and innovation’ he stressed.

Mr. Afenyo-Markin also charged the youth to develop the art of hard work, risk taking, critical thinking and innovation to propel them into self-dependence.

According to him, since becoming the Member of Parliament for Effutu, he has supported 5,000 individuals with startup capital of 1,000 cedis in promising projects within the constituency. The projects according to him, are creating new businesses and helping to expand existing ones.

‘In the process, we are creating wealth, reducing poverty, creating sustainable employment and above all, developing the next generation of intelligent businessmen and women. I am doing all of these knowing that one of the most notorious problems hindering the entrepreneurial spirit of many gifted people in our country is the lack of access to capital’ he added.

He expressed optimism that with bold steps, right attitude and financial support the Ghanaian youth can rise to the heights attained by global giants in the entrepreneurial space.