Participants at the 62nd New Year School have called for an effective youth development policy by harmonizing the activities of the National Youth Council, the National Youth Employment Program and the National Service Scheme as a prerequisite for a better deployment of the country’s resources in the training, education and nurturing of its youth. Director of the National Service Scheme, Mr. Vincent Kuagbenu who was also a participant at the school explained to Joy FM that the three bodies mentioned have a distinct role to play in achieving the common objective of mobilizing the youth for development. He said that unlike the National Service Secretariat whose operations are mandated by law, the National Youth Employment Program is yet to have a legal backing and tends to veer into other areas which targets groups which are outside of the youth category. He said that government has recently sped up work at the cabinet level to harmonize the operations of the various youth related organizations, citing his nomination to represent the minister of education on a committee which has been tasked to develop a National Youth Employment Act. Mr. Kuagbenu said that he remains unsure what the National Youth Council’s responsibility is, adding that if their mandate includes coordinating the activities of all the national youth bodies then he does not think they are doing their work well because they have not come to his outfit – the National Service Scheme to find out what it is doing and propose how best they can help direct the NSS activities to fall in line with the National Youth Policy. He said that he could not identify any serious dialogue or exchange of notes between the various organizations mentioned, adding that the organizations also operate under different ministries. Mr. Kuagbenu said that while the National Service Scheme is under the ministry of Education, the National Youth Employment Scheme and the National Youth Council are under the Ministry of Youth and Sports, making the call for a clearer definition of the specific roles of the organization very important. Mr. Kuagbenu expressed the desire for an integration of youth studies into the tertiary level education syllabus to inculcate a more critical view of the role of youth in students, and argued that the teaching of youth studies with the aim of imparting entrepreneurial skills to the youth may be more relevant for the total development of the youth if compared to the current study of programs such as Communication Skills, GDP courses, liberal studies, African studies. Source: Myjoyonline.com