The Northern Ghana Youth Network For Development has raised concerns about the Savanna Accelerated Development Authority. The concerns were contained in a press statement published below. Press release by the Northern Ghana Youth Network For Development (NGYND) raises alarm about SADA. TEL: 0266352659/0243661920/0266884270 For Immediate Release NGYND urges the Board and interim management of SADA to expedite action on the implementation of ACT 805, 2010 establishing the Savanna Accelerated Development Authority (SADA). We wish to state that among others that SADA's principal object is to improve on the ecological and economic conditions of the Savanna sector and reverse most of its vulnerabilities to advantages. We in NGYND are of the considered opinion that in order for SADA to realise its primary objectives it must be people owned instead of being held to the chest of some few individuals within the spectrum of the Savannah enclave of the country. This attitude has left a large chunk of the people especially children, women and the youth in the Savannah belt in darkness as to what SADA is all about. Apart from some few chiefs and a handful of intellectuals of Savannah decent in Accra who has been consulted and taking through the SADA development strategy nothing has been done again by management of SADA to enlighten the people about its basic principles and tenets except the recent forum organized in Tamale by SEND Foundation which is purely a civil society initiative. As a network of youth groups from Northern Ghana we find this snail pace attitude of SADA a disturbing phenomenon and immediate steps should be devised to curb such an anomaly. SADA should not be another bureaucracy or parastatal established as a symbolic and dysfunctional entity. In addition, NGYND is worried about the inability of government to provide the needed seed money for the take-off of the SADA process. Taking a cue from the admonition of H.E. President Mills that we should always endeavour to hold our leaders to the principles of accountability instead of limiting our participation in the democratic process only to the periodic casting of ballot, NGYND is therefore calling on the President to fast track his administration’s intention of facilitating and leading a donor and investment drive to attract the needed investment into the Savannah areas of the country. We are further calling on H.E. the President who is widely acclaimed as a father for all to as a matter of priority make sure there is a youth representation on the SADA Board in order to articulate the views of the vulnerable Savannah youth. There is currently nobody on the SADA Board whose age falls into the bracket of people defined as youth either by the United Nations, the African Union or even our own National Youth Policy. This has created a very huge generational imbalance which needs to be corrected. NGYND shall embark on a well strategised advocacy campaign to enlighten and sensitize the youth of northern Ghana on their stake in SADA and the reason for them to rise and demand that their views are very well integrated into the SADA implementation process. SIGNED: Muhammed Yakubu – Coordinator Abdul Razak Yakubu Mark Stephen Kubire