By Jimitota Onoyume
PORT-HARCOURT —  GOVERNMENTS at all levels in the country have been urged to treat youths as major stakeholders in project Nigeria.

In their separate speeches  at a one-day workshop on, Niger-Delta Youth Beyond the Amnesty, organised by the Niger Delta Develop-ment Commission (NDDC) in Port-Harcourt, weekend, Barrister Ledum Mitte and Professor Anya O. Anya said youths constitute a major part of the nation’s popula-tion and should, therefore, be part of any development process in the country.

Describing them as major stakeholders in the country’s future, Prof Anya in his paper, Exchanging Guns With Opportunities, enjoined governments in the country to come up with programmes and policies that would inspire the youths to dream great dreams for the country.

He said failures, as a nation in the past, were mainly caused by the poor attitude of past leadership in the country to the needs of youths.

Anya took time to laud steps so far taken by President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua to douse tension in the Niger Delta.

He also called for more opportunities to be created for youths in the country, so they could realise their potentials.

On his part, Ledum Mitee, President, Movement for the Survival of Ogoni People (MOSOP), who spoke on,  Preparing the Niger-Delta Youths for Socio-Economic Relevance, called for crea-tion of no fewer than 20,000 jobs for youths in each of the core Niger-Delta states as one way out of the challenges in the region.

Noting that the Federal Government should fully implement recommendations of the defunct Niger Delta Technical Committee which he chaired, Mitee also enjoined government and development institutions in the region to harmonise their development projects and programmes to avoid unnecessary duplication of efforts.

According to him, situations were government and development institu-tions continue to burn energy on the same project amounted to waste of funds.

Earlier in his opening address, the Managing Director, Niger Delta Deve-lopment Commission (NDDC), Mr. Chibuzor Ugwoha, said the commis-sion will take full advantage of the peace brought about by the amnesty to aggressi-vely pursue its development programmes in the region.

Ugwoha, who was represented by the commission’s Executive Director, Project, Mr. Esoetok Ekong Ikong Etteh, thanked the Federal Government for granting the commission’s request to award contracts to the tune of N187 billion, an amount he described as the highest single award in the history of the commission.