By Nana Akua Tweneboah-Koduah

Throughout the world, there is no record of a single social intervention program that has been rolled out to alleviate the social and economic situation of the poor and vulnerable that has not been fraught with either teething problems or some challenges midstream.

But when a social intervention program encounters some challenges you do not call for that program to be blown up. You will have to review the program taking into consideration the challenges it has encountered and its overall impact to the poor and vulnerable, and fix it.

If you walk away from such challenges, it’s like your son drowning in water and you refusing to drink anything made of water. That is not the way to go as a nation. It is only cowards and irresponsible people who run away from problems without using their God given ability to face life challenges.

Since independence Ghana has rolled up so many social intervention programs to support and upgrade the poor on the social ladder, but none of them have passed through the eye of the needle without hitting snags down the lane.

The Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurship Agency (GYEEDA), formerly the Ghana Youth Employment Programmes (NYEP) is one of such programs established in 2006 to help curtail the rising youth unemployment in the country.

Part of the program which started with an initial intake of 40,000 beneficiaries in 2006 but has since increased to over 400,000, has evolved around the training modules and empowerment of Youth in Community Health Extension Workers, Youth in Security Services, Youth in Community Education Teaching Assistants, Youth in Paid Interns, Waste and Sanitation and Trades and Vocation among others.

The GYEEDA modules which is managed by Zoomlion under the auspices of the Ministry of Youth and Sports has special arrangements to help the legatees to get permanent engagements by their institutions and private organizations such as clinics, private hospitals, private schools and private security agencies.

But just as all good intentioned social programs get stuck in the mud along the line, GYEEDA has become front and centre lately with allegations of financial malpractices. The speed with which the government responded to the contentions by setting up a five-member committee to delve into the issue is highly commendable.

The committee among other things will review the regulatory framework of GYEEDA, and how it has evolved to its current state, examining in detail the various modules and partner programmes.

The committee will further perform current state analysis of financial management; operation of bank accounts, procurement and contracting procedures, disbursements, human resource and other management practices in addition to reviewing the capacity of persons entrusted with certain key responsibilities related to the mandate of the programme.

Another key responsibility of the committee is to perform in-depth investigations of possible irregularities of crime and related financial losses and actions taken by management to recover possible embezzlement of money and other assets as the case may be and also evaluate the administrative and accounting procedures and disbursement procedures that have been followed.

All these tasks are being undertaken by the committee to help fix the problems that have emanated from GYEEDA for the continuous benefit of Ghanaians. Therefore, the call being made from certain quarters that the program must be blown up is totally premature and uncalled for.

If you look at the background of the committee members, you can deduce that they are capable of investigating and crafting a good report which can lead to a major shake-up and new direction of the program.

There may be financial disparities confronting GYEEDA, but no one has the overall facts yet. What we need to do is to wait for the final report to be released. The terms of reference clearly shows that some heads will roll if found to have involved in any malpractices. Therefore, the daily disparaging of the GYEEDA program and its officials must cease.

The eight weeks given to the committee to submit its final report will come soon. But whilst we wait I am of the view that the suspension of allowances to the beneficiaries must be paid in order not to bring any untold hardships to them.

The GYEEDA program is indeed a good one, therefore, we all need to come together as a country and find a lasting solution to the problems currently confronting it. I sincerely believe that if IMANI wakes up tomorrow and is confronted with some challenges the organization will not allow itself to be blown up. They will strategize and fix the problems. That is the way to go!

nakuakoduah@yahoo.com