Accra, July 18, GNA - The youth have been advised to emulate great people so that they would be able to efficiently look after society when the older generation was no more.

Sheikh Ibrahim Codjoe Quaye, Greater Accra Regional Minister, who gave the advice during a courtesy call on him by Royal Ambassadors International, an Accra-based Christian youth organization, also urged the youth to be patient, humble and hardworking so that they could effectively take up the mantle from the older ones at the right time. "The youth are the wealth of the nation and are being looked up to," Sheikh Quaye told members of the youth group. The organisation, together with "Youth Aflame", also a Christian organisation based in California, USA, called on the Minister to inform him of their 10-day programme to be held throughout the country in selected schools, churches and communities.

Among activities to be held are talks on HIV/AIDS, evangelism, career development training, music and drama shows and seminars, dubbed, "Youth Explosion". Sheikh Quaye commended the 19 members of Youth Aflame for expressing their love for others and their special interest in seeing to the spiritual and social needs of their colleagues in other parts of the world.

He commended them for particularly paying their own fares to Ghana, evangelise and share what they had with others.

He said if people of the world would show love to each other, like they had done, there would be peace in the world. "Where there is love, there is peace and where there is hatred there are conflicts and wars." Miss Gloria Afua Akuffo, Deputy Minister of Greater Accra, called for open discussion on sex and sexuality among the youth so that they could freely discuss the menace of HIV/AIDS and to avoid it.

She said because of the peculiar upbringing of Ghanaians, coupled with the culture, it had been difficult to talk openly about sex, particularly, among the youth leading to a large segment of them being infected with HIV/AIDS.

"Unless we begin to talk about sex and sexuality, without considering it as obscene, we will not be able to address the menace of HIV/AIDS," Miss Akuffo said.

Mr Nicholas Kwabena Lebey, President of Royal Ambassadors International, said their mission was to complement the efforts of Vice President Aliu Mahama to ensure discipline among the youth.