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Anyone who has read the story of Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah will notice one striking thing about his age and his level of thinking which culminated in the numerous landmark achievements he attained. He was only 38 years old when he assumed the General Secretary ship role of the biggest political grouping in West Africa then, the United Gold Coast Convention ( UGCC). At the time he led the county to attain Independence, Nkrumah was only 48 years old and therefore thought differently. He was chastised, criticised and accused of being overly ambitious. Today, the whole country is left with no other structures and facilities except those build and bequeathed to us by the same man we called �revolutionary�. After Nkrumah has been the emergence of a number of personalities, though youthfully, proved to be extremely progressive and visionary and yet refused to be recognised by society. Roland Agambire is one of such. His Rlg started from nowhere, supported by different governments and today, he has become a global icon and an influential business leader. His passion and compassion for youth employment is evidently demonstrated by his work in Ghana alone and Africa in general, emulated by a teaming youth across the continent. His idea of using ICT to transform the youth into economically resourceful segment of our society is what inspired the ICT Module under GYEEDA. No wonder he was not too long ago awarded the Africa�s Telecom Personality for the year 2012. The impact of his initiatives, particularly the Youth-In-ICT Module is affirmed by a number of beneficiaries interviewed by the Ministerial Review Committee. In their own report, it was said that �indeed 100% of randomly sampled beneficiaries expressly indicated that they had benefitted positively from the initiative and together with key stakeholders interviewed advocated that the initiative should be strengthened. Consequently in spite of the challenges there have been many positive outcomes�. It is on this basis that one finds it too worrying attempts to conclude that all was bad with GYEEDA. Yusif Sumaila is 26 year old. Five years ago, he got enrolled onto the ICT Module with the then NYEP after staying at home for months after completing JHS in his native Brong Ahafo region. Today, he is a fully employed senior technician at Rlg�s Assembly Plant, earning good income. His story is just one of numerous who but for the ICT Module would have been rendered hopeless. In the words of the ministerial committee, such �case studies of successful beneficiaries should be captured and use to encourage more youth to work harder by both the service provider and GYEEDA�. From all indications, the committee realised that the social impact, benefit and good of GYEEDA overweigh its bad side and if so why has the impression been created that the problems of GYEEDA are the doings of Agambire and others? It becomes more difficult to comprehend when in their own report they have clearly cited the reasons for the woes of GYEEDA. For the benefit of readers, their reasons are as follows that �GYEEDA�s problems were occasioned by high level institutional and systems failures within and across the executive and legislative arms of Government. For instance: 1. Various Cabinets since 2006, failed to take action in providing the Programme with an appropriate legal framework, governance structure, mandate and sources of funds; 2. Parliaments since 2006 continuously approved payments or funding allocations to GYEEDA from sources such as the DACF without the necessary amendments and legal authority; 3. Various Ministers of State with oversight responsibility for NYEP/GYEEDA since 2006 neglected to request for value for money analyses prior to the execution of contracts on behalf of the State; 4. Very senior lawyers of the Attorney-General�s Department do not appear to have diligently provided the needed advice and support to Ministers on the need for NYEP/GYEEDA to adhere to the Procurement rules, especially those relating to single sourcing; 5. The DAFC has since 2006, disbursed various sums of money to GYEEDA even though by law, the Administrator of the Fund does not have the mandate to disburse funds to entities other than District Assemblies; 6. The Public Procurement Authority neglected to verify the necessary details in an application granted on 13th December, 2012 for single sourcing. The Authority failed to verify whether an application granted under a �follow up� assignment exception did have an original contract regularly procured.� Isn�t it therefore interesting that none of the modules under GYEEDA recommended for discontinuation or MOUs recommended for termination belongs to him? Maybe it�s for the simple reason that he has been one person who has not only been a goodwill ambassador and a strong advocate of the programme but has gone ahead to promote its adaptation to many countries both within the sub-region and beyond and this is amply captured in the report when the committee wrote that � �.. There are significant benefits to accrue through a proper governance framework and positioning of GYEEDA nationally and internationally, as other countries in the sub-region have been trying to adapt the Ghana model�. Indeed the Zambians, Angolans, the government and people of Equatorial Guinea, Senegal, Nigeria, Liberia and Sierra Leone have all seen the good in GYEEDA as a powerful tool to make the growing youth resourceful. Just like in Ghana, Rlg has taken the initiative, and began investing in the initiative in these countries. Already in Nigeria, the module is helping the youth of Osun State quiet significantly. In the Gambia, the whole country welcomed Roland Agambire�s Rlg entry which has since given skills and jobs to many youth of the West African state. During the inauguration of the Rlg�s second Assembly Plant and showroom in Banjul early this year, the World Bank office in Sierra Leone sent a delegation with the dual task of witnessing the ceremony and discussing with Rlg officials the possibility of duplicating the facility in the war-ravaged country. Apart from cocoa, oil and football, GYEEDA has been the new success story, projecting the country in a very progressive manner. The adage is never despise little beginnings and so deep is the popular saying that a journey of a thousand mile begins with a step. In the year 1999, when he invested his first $200,000 into an internet caf� business in Accra, little did the then 25 year Roland Agambire know that 13 years later, his name will be equated with social justice and equity. A firm believer in risk taking, Agambire had prepared himself to take advantage of the opportunities brought by the newly heralded era of the dotcom but not long after, he had to rethink because the fortunes of internet cafes had dwindled. Many would have seen that as a misfortune but not Agambire who took it as an opportunity to and decided to venture into another risky area, going on to set up an outlet to train young people in the area of mobile phone and computer repairs. At this he had envisioned an enormous opportunity to be created as a result of the soon-to-be proliferation of mobile phones. For him, it was an opportunity to make some money but placing the socio-economically outcast at the center. It is significant to point out that this was long before government came to the realisation that the youth unemployment statistics were not only escalating but had become a security issue. That is why Roagam Links came about. He had a number of centers established training a large number of youth. So committed and sincere was his intervention that then President Kufuor led government to secure a MASLOC loan of 1.2 million cedis for his business. Upon expiration of that facility, Agambire paid back a total amount of 1.8 million cedis including interest. The government through EDAIF is said to have offered some of his companies like Asongtaba Cottage and Cratpro some 500,000 cedis at a 12% interest rate and was also paid back later with interest. The credit worthiness of his companies are evident in the prompt manner he pays back loans offered him. Indeed under the NDC administration, he has contracted a number of facilities including a 1.7 million cedi interest free loan which has since been paid back to government. So when in 2006 the NPP government took a decision to establish the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP), one of the modules it decided to focus on was Youth �In-ICT and because Roland Agambire�s Roagam Links which later became Rlg Communications Ltd was already implementing the module, government did not have a choice than to fall on him to nationalise it to benefit a lot more young people, a clear indication that government at that time had endorsed Agambire�s initiatives on skilling and tooling the youth to curb unemployment. The successive NDC government choose to follow the path the NPP had chattered. It is therefore not surprising that one of the good things the recent Ministerial Impact Assessment and Review Committee into the operations of the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Development Agency (GYEEDA) succeeded in doing was to highlight significantly, the very importance and social impact of the both the entire scheme as well as some of the modules it runs. Rather sadly however, social commentaries, critiques and media exposes have failed to project such significant achievements. For example, the 161-page report makes cogent reference to face-to-face encounters with some beneficiaries who did not hesitate to inform the committee how beneficial their training and subsequent tooling and setting up has helped them socio-economically. In one of the pages, the report quotes one George Nyarko, a beneficiary of the Youth-in-ICT Module being run by Rlg Communications Group Ltd. as saying �I do not depend on anybody for my daily bread and I have paid for my accommodation 2years in advance @GHS35/month�. The committee observed that even though Rlg provides training manuals and text books for the training, the lack of personal ICT textbooks for private studies ought to change. The committee observed also that so essential is the module that it offers skills for mobile phone hardware repairs, provides working tools for beneficiaries and provides income to cater for beneficiary�s family upon successful completion of the 6months training. It was however suggested that because currently computer hardware has been added to the training, the course duration ought to be extended. The committee also lauded the existence of a detailed exit plan in that particular module, a practice it urges other service providers to emulate. �My income is helping me cater for my family including 3 kids�, John Paul Ahiagbor, another ICT Module beneficiary is captured in the report as saying. The report recommends that case studies of successful beneficiaries should be captured, highlighted and used to encourage more youth to work harder by both the Service Provider and GYEEDA. An overall objective of the GYEEDA programme was to create opportunity for government to invest in the people, particularly young people who are unemployed but skilled and desirous of doing something meaningful. How that was to be done is captured in the various exit plans of the various models; that is either a permanent employment is created for beneficiaries, offloaded to a private organisation or assisted to set up on his or her own upon completion of training. Nice as these sounded, there were obstacles to achieving them. For instance, Rlg Communications was to payback all monies taken from government to run the Youth-In �ICT module with interest, a condition it has faithfully been complying to but this meant the service provider will not be left with no money until next loan is granted. The Impact Assessment and Review Committee figures have it that between 2006 and 2012, as much as 65,000 youth were recruited onto the dressmaking module alone whilst 55,000 and 40,000 were enrolled onto the youth-in-ICT and hairdressing modules respectively. In terms of actual beneficiaries, the committee established that between the year 2009 and 2010 alone, 25,000 youth benefitted from the dressmaking module administered by Asongtaba Cottage and Exchange Programme while 10,402 youth became beneficiaries of the hairdressing programme. For mobile phone repairs, 4,939 beneficiaries learnt the trade from Rlg Institute of Technology Centres nationwide. The committee in their value for money analysis, said �available data seems to suggest that Rlg�s ICT module has succeeded in creating opportunities for persons in most of the regions, most especially those from the upper east region. This is especially so considering the possibility of direct employment by RLG of persons trained under the module�. It was also the view of the committee that �in terms of alignment with overarching GYEEDA Mission, relevance and robustness of Module, the Rlg module aligns with the overarching objective of GYEEDA to create sustainable employment�. That perhaps explains the reason why on humanitarian grounds, the company decided to permanently employ a substantial number of the beneficiaries who would have been at the mercy of the ever tightening job market. At the company�s Assembly Plant at Osu, over 200 of them have jobs with appreciably good working conditions. For instance, in one of the training contract MOUs dated 12th October, 2009, Asongtaba Cottage and Exchange Programme took an interest free loan of 7,185,475 and provide a counterpart funding of 1,268,025. The loan has been paid back. By another MOU dated 3rd August, 2009, Rlg was offered an interest-free loan facility totalling 1,792, 877.50 cedis for the training of 5,000 people. Rlg was to provide a counterpart funding of 338,760 cedis. Additionally, it was Rlg�s duty to set the trainees up upon completion of training. The monies have since been paid back in full. By essence, Rlg, the service provider will have to pay such people using little profits, if any at all to do this kind of job. In the long run who is really investing in the people? Is it the service provider or government? In their own report, the Ministerial Committee on Review and Impact Assessment said �the GYEEDA concept is as relevant today as it was when it was introduced�. Indeed the committee went ahead to evaluate the importance of some of the modules and among the three that scored high marks were the Youth-in-ICT or phone repairs and dressmaking. The Dressmaking module which is being run by Asongtaba Cottage and Exchange Programme scored 10/10, translating to an impressive 100% endorsement while the ICT module scored 7/10. The committee went ahead to hear the testimony of one training instructor who said �providing training to trainees has helped to make me more popular and as I teach them I get to learn more and sharpen my skills. In fact, on daily basis more youth come to ask for training and some of those I have trained have also opened shops. The difficulty is you may not have time for your own work/ client orders�. She continued that she received her sewing machine; training was offered and was paid for and set up kiosk provided. Now am saving to purchase Knitting & Locking machine. A beneficiary, Peace Asanya captured this essence in a different way when she told the committee that �not only am I making dresses I have also started training one intern�. In many African countries today, various governments have decided to adopt the Ghana�s GYEEDA concept as a feasible model for the economic transformation of young people. Currently in Nigeria and the Gambia, RLG has been helping their respective governments to implement the initiative. At a recent World Bank Group Meeting on Youth Employment in Abuja, government officials from Liberia, Sierra Leone and Senegal expressed the desire to adopt Ghana�s strategy which the international community believes has been hugely a success. This also explains the numerous frequent visits to Rlg�s ultra-modern Assembly Plant in Ghana, the first of its kind in our part of the continent. The Plant has since been visited by a former Zambian President, a Vice President of Microsoft Corporation, Senators and Governors from Nigeria, senior government officials from Equatorial Guinea, Members of Ghana�s Parliament, and some ministers of state, among others. One is therefore compelled to ask that is this another case of a prophet not being accepted in his own home?