Comrade Steven Nhyira Odarteifio has declared his candidature for National Youth Organis er of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), pledging to help President John Dramani Mahama and his government turn the political mandate entrusted to the party by Ghanaians into broader economic opportunity, dignity and hope for the country’s young people.
The declaration comes with a conviction that the NDC’s return to government under President Mahama represents more than a change of administration.
It is an opportunity to renew the social contract with a generation of young Ghanaians who voted for a government that promised jobs, skills, enterprise and a more inclusive economy.
Comrade Odarteifio said the NDC Youth Wing must become a powerful bridge between the opportunities being created by the Mahama administration and the millions of young people who need access to them.
Programmes such as Adwumawura, the National Apprenticeship Programme and One Million Coders, he said, demonstrate the government’s determination to equip young Ghanaians for a changing economy. The task now is to ensure that these interventions reach the people for whom they were designed.
“This candidature is rooted not in ambition, but in obligation. Millions of young Ghanaians placed their faith in President Mahama and the NDC because they believed in a Ghana of opportunity and dignity. Our responsibility is to make that faith count,” Comrade Odarteifio said.
It was greeted with rapturous applause, singing, dancing and chants from enthusiastic supporters gathered for the occasion, including many of his constituents.
The charged atmosphere reflected the excitement surrounding his entry into the contest, with supporters repeatedly cheering his name and expressing confidence in his ability to bring a new energy and sense of purpose to the NDC Youth Wing.
He added that the Youth Wing must move beyond election-time mobilisation and become an enduring vehicle for connecting young people to capital, skills, enterprise, agriculture, technology and markets.
“We need a Youth Wing that does not only mobilise young people for political power, but mobilises opportunity between elections. We must help convert the political power entrusted to the NDC into economic opportunity for the young people of Ghana,” he said.
Comrade Odarteifio said his vision is to help the Youth Wing contribute to the economic empowerment of at least one million additional young Ghanaians before the end of President Mahama administration, while strengthening the party’s grassroots structures and giving a new generation of members a meaningful stake in Ghana’s economic transformation.
A central pillar of his vision is agriculture, which he believes can become one of the country’s most powerful engines of youth employment, enterprise and industrialisation.
He is also the brain behind the Ghana Agricultural Fund for Education and Transformation (GAFET), an initiative targeting a GH¢100 million endowment by December 2028 to finance agricultural education and help address the skills gap threatening the sector’s long-term transformation.
BY TIMES REPORTER
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