Koforidua, June 24, GNA - National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has introduced a programme for "Project Citizen" in selected schools to infuse civic values and patriotism in the youth through extra academic work for the school children.

The project is aimed at training school children to understand governance, public policy, lobbying, public speaking, project writing and citizenship as part of the mandate of the NCCE to imbibe civic responsibility in the fabric of society. Mr Emmanuel Quaye-Sowah, Eastern Regional Director for NCCE, said at the opening of the first project citizen by selected schools in the region on Tuesday that it would also equip the youth to participate in national development processes. The Eastern Regional showcase underway in Koforidua for the next three days is the first of its kind and a component of the "Citizen Project."

The selected schools would present their portfolios on selected topics hampering progress in their communities and their solutions using state policies.

The 16 selected senior and junior high schools from the region would present topics such as child labour, teenage pregnancies, refusal to vote during elections and national activities and high illiteracy rate in communities among other topics.

He said since 1994, the NCCE has advocated for the re-introduction of civics as an examinable subject into school curriculum with a strong conviction that "all round development of the Ghanaian is incomplete without the infusion of civic values through conscious and consistent efforts".

Although this call had not been heeded, Mr Quaye-Sowah said, the NCCE had not relented in its mandate and mentioned the introduction of the constitution game and the formation of civic education clubs in schools as some of the strategic efforts it had embarked on to redress the broking down of patriotism on the part of the youth. He said academic and paper qualifications alone were not enough to move the agenda of national development without requisite training, a guarantee of responsible citizens.

Mrs Fanny Kuma, a co-director of the project and director of literature at NCCE, said the project was operating in 111 schools in five regions on pilot basis to be extended to the other regions. She said under the project 40 teachers had been trained from the schools and regions on how to guide the children in using state policies to solve problems in their communities.

Mrs Kuma commended the children for the hard work and the spirit of patriotism they showed by accepting to be part of the groups. Mr Kwame Amo-Darko, a past president of the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT), lauded the NCCE for such a masterpiece project, which he described as a strategic academic work that would not only help the children to learn but to have a feel of what it takes and means to be a responsible citizen. He said democracy required that every citizen participated in the development process and not to follow an action by a certain category of people. "It is only when all manner of citizens are carried aboard without recourse to their age and social standing that we can consolidate our democracy".