Accra, Aug. 19, GNA - Vice President Alhaji Aliu Mahama on Saturday urged the youth to embrace measures that would develop their talents to accelerate Ghana's pace of development. He declared that Ghana was still worth dying for therefore, the youth should remain resilient even in the current seemingly difficult situation.

"We have to look at the manner the National Football team, the Black Stars raised the image of Ghana and Africans all over the world and carry on the fight to cause a change in this country believing that change is possible with extra effort, skill and determination," Alhaji Mahama added.

Alhaji Mahama made the call at the Newmont Ghana National Youth Achievers Awards ceremony at the University of Ghana Legon in Accra. The event is a collaboration of Newmont Ghana and the Excellence Awards Foundation with sponsorship from other private companies. It seeks to empower the youth in community activism, national development, political awareness and sustainable peace in the country. Alhaji Mahama asked the youth to eschew negative tendencies and work hard to create a society where the country's cultural norms and practices would constitute the basis of moral judgement.

He noted that the awards was the basis for developing and strengthening mentorship programmes among the youth in the communities and urged community leaders and corporate bodies not to relent in supporting the youth to achieve successes.

On indiscipline in the society, the Vice President said it was a situation where the use of insulting language against perceived adversaries should not exist.

"Specifically, I am looking forward to a day when we can actually live together as one big family called Ghanaians." He noted that without discipline, Ghanaians could not accomplish the difficult task of building Ghana into a great and prosperous nation, stressing that, "The path to greatness is staring at us in the face and we should not allow it to elude us."

Vice President Mahama said; "Since the youth become what they hear and see as they grow, if society applauds excellence, the youth will aspire to excellence as a matter of course."

"But if we admire and indulge in that which does not edify the spirit, the youth will end up in a society with a scanty regard for excellence and dignity in life."

Vice President Mahama reiterated government's philosophy of property owning democracy where possession of talent was a property, which must be allowed to develop in freedom to achieve whatever it was capable of, for the benefit of the individual and society as a whole. He said government was sensitive to youth unemployment, which sometimes lured them to indulge in undesirable social practices and desiring greener pastures outside Ghana.

Alhaji Mahama said it was in recognition of this that government policy was aimed at maximising energies of the youth through human resource development.

He was optimistic that the youth employment programme, micro credit loans, debt relief and the Millennium Challenge Account would impact positively on the prospects of the youth to gain integration into the socio-economic mainstream of Ghana. Vice President Mahama commended the management of Newmont Ghana, lead sponsors of the awards, for showing the way and asked other companies to support the idea of developing youth talent throughout the country.

Alhaji Abubakar Saddique Boniface, Minister of Manpower, Youth and Employment said when good virtues were inculcated in the youth now the nation's future would be bright and secured. "Ghana will then escape the trauma of class, religious, ethnic and gender strife and vices such as corruption, evasion of taxes, disrespect for authority and other divisive tendencies currently plaguing the nation," he added.

Alhaji Boniface said there was a duty imposed on parents and government to shape the future of the youth in the country. He commended the 24 companies that sponsored the awards for exhibiting good corporate citizenship and support for the youth and urged the youth not to relent in their tasks. Dr Chris Anderson, Director in-charge of External Affairs, Newmont Ghana Limited said the company invested about 500 million cedis towards the awards.

"This is not going to be separate from what we do in our localities. It will be complementary of what we do in our communities where we mine as well as at the national level where we will seek collaboration with others to change their economic situation."

Dr Yaw Perbi, a motivational speaker won the Newmont Ghana Highest Award for Excellence while Ms Abena Amoah, a stockbroker, won the Dr Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng Award for Tertiary Academic Excellence. Twenty-two other youths who had exhibited rare skill, innovation and excellence in all the 10 regions in their chosen fields of endeavour also received awards.