Election 2024: Dr. Bawumia promises to empower youth for digital economy

Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the flagbearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) says his agenda is to empower young people for the digital economy as a means of solving the unemployment challenge in the country.He said his government would continue with the vigorous digitalisation agenda of the country, which the NPP government had started to create jobs for the teeming youth if he was voted into power as the president.Dr Bawumia, who said this in Wa during a rally as part of his campaign tour of the Upper West Region, indicated that they would also train at least one million youth in digital skills.The Vice President and flagbearer of the NPP commenced his tour of the region on Monday, July 22 and was expected to end on Thursday, July 25, 2024.A mass of electorates massed up at the Wa Tendamba Junior High School Park on Monday night to receive the Vice President and his campaign team.The euphoria at the ground was spectacular when the Vice President and his team arrived at the rally ground to address the ent husiastic electorates, the majority of whom were young people.Addressing the crowd, Dr. Bawumia indicated that the NPP government had exhibited commitment to ensuring that every child and young person in Ghana was educated irrespective of his or her economic status through the Free Senior High School policy.He explained that the intervention was part of a grand agenda of building a literate society to take advantage of the digitalisation age of the world.'This election is a simple choice, do we want to go into the future, into the digital age or we want to go back into the 'akonfem' (guinea fowl) age.'Do you want to go forward or backward. We want to go forward; we want to change this country. I want to build an economy that can create jobs for the youth and that is why we are digitalising the economy.We are building a new Ghana; we want to make sure our youth are educated. My brothers, my sisters, we are talking about the future and the future is about the youth,' Dr. Bawumia explained.He announc ed that his government would work to enhance internet connectivity in all communities in the country and abolish taxes on mobile phones to ensure access to a smart phone by every Ghanaian youth, which was a prerequisite for maximising the digital economy.Dr. Bawumia said the restoration of the teacher trainee and nursing training allowances by the President Akufo-Addo-led government, which was cancelled by the former President John Dramani Mahama-led government was a testament of the commitment of the NPP to ensuring access to education by every Ghanaian.He, thus, courted the support of all electorates in the Upper West Region by voting for him on December 7, 2024, to enable him to bring his plans for the country and the youth into fruition to better improve the living conditions of Ghanaians.Hajia Humu Awudu, the NPP Parliamentary Candidate for the Wa Central Constituency, told the youth that voting for her and Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia on December 7, 2024, would mean voting for jobs for the youths.She cl aimed that Dr. Hassan Rashid Pelpuo, the current Member of Parliament for the Wa Central Constituency, did not have a soft spot for the teeming unemployed youth in the constituency hence the need to reject him on December 7, 2024.Source: Ghana News Agency