Seperating the Youth from Sports ministry: what the NPP is not getting

Speaking at the recent unveiling of the National Youth Secretariat of the National Democratic Congress, President John Mahama re-echoed his plans to create a separate Ministry for Youth Development instead of sticking to the current arrangement where Youth and Sports have been merged into a single Ministry.

Mr Mahama’s argument has been simple but thoughtful and forward looking. That, over the years, the Ministry of Youth and Sports has existed in name and on paper but not in reality. The Ministry has been reduced to only Sports ministry without any attention to youth development. Even with the focus on Sports, substantial attention has been given to only football. Again, even with football, the focus has been the Black Stars to the neglect of others.

What Mr Mahama is promising to do when given the opportunity to lead this country in 2025 is to decouple the Youth component from the Sports Ministry. This is to help focus special attention on developing youth tailored policies to meet the needs and aspirations of the ever growing but substantially idle youthful population of Ghana. The creation of the Youth Development Ministry would also afford the government opportunity to have adequate oversight on youth related agencies under the Ministry to, among other things, address the country’s jaw dropping 14% unemployment rate.

Expectedly, this proposal, like the 2024 hour economy policy proposal, has sent shivers down the spine of the New Patriotic Party and as a result, they are falling over each other on how to discredit it. In their attempt to do that, they have exposed their ignorance and lack of understanding of what Mr Mahama really meant when he said he would downsize his government and reduce the number of Ministers to 60.

The argument of NPP communicators who have so far taken a bite at the cherry to criticize Mr Mahama is that, the NDC flag bearer cannot promise to reduce the number of Ministers when elected and at the same time say he would separate the Youth from Sports Ministry. According to them, a promise to separate Youth and Sports Ministry would automatically increase the number of ministries and ministers.

On the face of it, that is how it looks like but the poverty in this reasoning is exposed when this promise is tied with a contextual proposition by Mr Mahama to collapse some existing ministries and merge others. For instance, the NDC government under Mills and Mahama kept fisheries and agric ministries under one unit. Under Mahama, communication and information was one ministry. Railway, aviation and transport sectors were kept under one ministry under Mahama. This was not the case under Mr John Kufuor, and under President Akufo Addo and Bawumia, some amorphous ministries have been created that has resulted in the present elephant size government.

Because of how past and present NPP governments have created needless ministries, leading to an increase in the number of ministers, the thinking of their communicators is that once Mahama is promising to decouple Youth and Sports, it’s a contradiction to his promise to reduce the number of ministers to 60. It cannot be a contradiction. Given the kind of ministries created under Mahama, he would seamlessly decouple the sports and youth ministry and still stay within his promise of working with only 60 ministers.

If, for instance, Mr Mahama decides to create 19 ministries to meet the constitutional requirement of Cabinet Ministers with a deputy each, and 16 regional ministers without deputies, that would be 54 ministers and deputies. This would mean that he would have additional 6 slots left to meet his threshold of 60. With the practice of having ministers of state at the presidency and two deputies for some sensitive ministries like Local Government, Justice and Attorney General etc , he can still do it.

In recent times, there has been calls to also decouple the Justice and Attorney General ministry. This can be done and Mr Mahama would not detract from his 60 ministers promise. A creation or separation of Ministries do not necessarily lead to increase in the number of ministries and ministers. In some instances, as it would be in the case of Mr Mahama, it would reduce the number of Ministers and ministers.

The Youth Development Ministry being proposed by Mr Mahama is very vital to the development of this country. No country has developed without paying special attention to the development of its youth. The youth form majority of Ghana’s population and their major challenge in recent history is unemployment and underemployment. Some may argue that there are institutions or agencies charged to deal with youth policies to address unemployment and underemployment challenges.

That argument is correct but these agencies are either under the Youth and Sports Ministry or Employment and Labor Relations Ministry under the current arrangement. These miniatries over the years have not focused on the youth aspect of their mandates and have left the agencies under them to under perform. The Employment and Labor Relations Ministry, for instance, has been reduced to a Ministry for ‘begging’ striking Labour unions to call off strike and get to the negotiation table. This ministry has not taken key interests in how agencies like YEA, NEIP etc create employment for youth people.

The Youth and Sports Ministry too in its current form, as already mentioned, has been limited to Black Stars. There has been nothing ‘youthful’ about this Ministry. If there was, colts football would not be in its present sordid state. These, amongst other reasons, is why the Youth Development Ministry Mr Mahama promised in his 2020 manifesto and is promising again, is very crucial.

Amos Blessing Amorse
Regional Youth Organizer
Greater Accra NDC
abamorse@st.ug.edu.gh