President John Dramani Mahama has announced that the Youth Employment Agency (YEA) formerly known as the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP) would employ 100,000 youth in 2016 as a means of solving the youth unemployment in the country.

He said many of the beneficiaries would be committed to aforestation or tree growing as measures of greening the country to arrest eminent desertification, especially the Northern parts of Ghana.

President Mahama announced this on Sunday during the commissioning of a 152-unit market stalls financed under a World Bank programme to the tune of about GH¢1.2 million to stimulate economic activities in the Tamale Metropolis.

The commissioning was part of the President’s two-day "Changing Lives" campaign tour of the region, which he also used to solicit the mandate of NDC delegates to select winsome Parliamentary candidates for the 2016 general election and appealed to them to endorse his candidature overwhelmingly to lead the party for a historic one touch second term win.

He said a Bill to transform YEA was in Parliament, which had delayed in recruitment and assured that all the necessary legislations would be worked on by Parliament for the recruitment to take off to offer the youth with the needed employment.

President Mahama said Tamale was the gateway to the Savanna and the Sahelian Region and that commercial activities had improved tremendously, where people from Burkina-Faso and other places were coming to market in Tamale and stressed the importance of upgrading the markets.

He said the Aboabo market, which had been the second largest commercial market in Tamale, was under construction while a heavy-duty lorry park at Aboabo was under construction to accommodate heavy duty vehicles from the Sahelian region.

He commended the Tamale Metropolitan Chief Executive (MCE) for his vision of developing the Metropolis especially his intention to grow 20 million trees in Tamale and assured him of the Presidency support for the vision to materialize.

He said the NDC government was people centred and that any initiative by any individual or group of persons to have a positive impact on the country and its people would be supported and that he would hold the MCE on for him to fulfil his vision.

Alhaji Hanan Abdul-Rahman Gundadow, the Tamale Metropolitan Chief Executive (MCE) announced that the assembly had put measures in place to grow 20 million trees in the Tamale Metropolis.

President Mahama later paid a courtesy call on the Northern Regional House chiefs, where he assured the chiefs of doing everything possible to ensure peace for the country.

He also explained the development agenda of the government to the chiefs and assured that road infrastructure would be improved and mentioned that the roads linking Yendi-Saboba-Chereponi, Yendi-Tatale-Sangule, Salaga-Bimbila and Tamale-Makango would be tarred to enhance economic activities.