The cost of hiring a presidential jet for President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-excursions Addo’s outside the nation, according to North Tongu Member of Parliament Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, is sufficient to pay 7000 trainees under the Nation Builders Corps (NACO) program.
Ghana will spend $4.5 million on the chartered presidential jet, according to him.
According to him, President Akufo-Addo could have paid as many as 7000 NABCO trainees with a stipend of 700 cedis.
Mr Ablakwa tweeted on Tuesday, February 22, he wrote;
“with the latest lavish presidential cruise costing the Ghanaian taxpayer some GHS4.9million; what this actually means is that at a stipend of GHS700 a month, President Akufo-Addo could have paid as many as 7000 NABCO trainees & perhaps avert the NABCO demonstrations,”
Members of the NABCO initiative took to the streets to protest in Accra, on Thursday, February 17 following the government’s inability to pay them. The government has failed to pay them which triggered the protest as they are been owed four months’ salary arrears.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo launched NABCO on Tuesday, May 1, 2018.
While launching the program, Mr. Akufo-Addo expressed confidence that by the time NABCO trainees graduated, “the requisite work readiness skills and experience, often deemed a barrier to their employment as fresh graduates, would have been resolved.”
According to President Akufo-Addo, “NABCO will be the vehicle to deliver one hundred thousand (100,000) jobs in seven (7) prioritised areas, defined as the following modules: Educate Ghana; Heal Ghana; Feed Ghana; Revenue Ghana; Digitise Ghana; Enterprise Ghana; and Civic Ghana.”
President Akufo-Addo explained the rationale for the Corps’ creation by stating that the tragic story of youth unemployment had been a tragic part of Ghanaians’ lives for far too long.
The problem, he claimed, was exacerbated by the International Monetary Fund’s ban on public sector hiring at the time.
“I gave an indication that a new employment scheme will be launched to tackle the issue of the growing numbers of graduates exiting our tertiary institutions with no job placements in sight,” he said.
The President stated that NABCO’s main goal was to provide work opportunities for young people with diplomas or degrees from approved higher institutions, and that this was the organization’s primary goal, adding that “NABCO will enhance the dignity and self-esteem of our graduates, and will also present them with the added benefit of efficiency and effectiveness in the delivery of some essential public services.”
