To enable youths to attain their potentials and be responsible in the society, an Osun-based group, Kimpact Development Initiative (KDI) is targeting about 2.5 million youths through its Osun Youth Agenda.
To enable the youths to have a voice and ensure their voices counted in the state, KDI is partnering international bodies and also training journalists to make the vision a reality.
The Executive Director of the Group, Mr Bukola Idowu, while speaking on Friday in Osogbo during an advocacy training for media practitioners applauded the Department for International Development (DFID), United State Agency for International Development (USAID) and the National Democratic Initiative (NDI) for supporting Nigerian youths to reach potentials through OYA.
He said, “the international bodies are really playing vital roles toward ensuring that the future of our youths are guaranteed and secured,” he said.
Commenting on OYA, Idowu said the agenda was aimed at building accountable relationship with advocacy targets, focusing on priority needs of the youths.
Idowu said that the Osun Youth Agenda, an offshoot of the “Vote, Not Fight” campaign group was aimed at discouraging youths from wrong doing and motivating them to imbibe good behaviours.
“We are engaging youths across the state to divert them from wrong way of life and put them on the right path.
“This initiative will enable the youths to demand for what is due to them from government.
“We aim to mobilise quality set of youths who can make great things happen, propel and drive positive changes not necessarily by engaging in Aluta and confrontation.
“We succeeded in the “Vote, Not Fight” campaign and we are convinced that this Osun Youth Agenda will be another success story,” he said.
Idowu further said that about 6,000 youths would embark on peaceful rally across the state in August to mark the youths day celebration and to present the youth agenda to the policy makers.
He said the youth agenda initiative was in Ekiti and Kaduna States and would spread to other states across the country soon.
In his remarks, Mr Ben Aga, the Senior Programme Manager of NDI, who spoke on Strategic Communication, said the media had huge role to play in shaping the future of the youths.
Aga commended the journalists in Osun for prompting the agenda and charged them to do more.
Mr Rasheed Adebiyi, a Communication Specialist and Lecturer at the Department of Mass Communication, Fountain University, Osogbo, facilitated a session on ‘Understanding Development Reporting.’
He urged journalists to be proactive and professional in the discharge of their duties, adding that development reporting should be of priority to them.
Adebiyi, also urged journalists to always set agenda for government at all levels through its programmes and policies, which he said would in turn make the country great.
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