A non-governmental organisation in Jos Green Centre, says it has trained 250 youths drawn from the 17 local government areas of the state on Advocacy Movement and Open Government Partnership (OGP).
The training is to enable them effectively engage the government, the organisation stated on Sunday in a news conference.
The team leader of the organisation, Mr Oscar Danladi, said that apart from the training of the youths, “the organisation intends to use the medium to promote youth understanding and participation in OGP constructively.
According to him, other objectives of the training is to develop a youth focused toolkit for use in engagement with government and to enable the youths’ campaign around the OGP and get citizens to buy-in on the process.
He said that the OGP provided an avenue for constructive youth engagement with the government.
He defined OGP as a multi- stakeholder initiative focused on improving transparency, accountability, citizen participation and responsiveness to citizens through technology and innovation.
Earlier, the Deputy Country Director of TearFund Nigeria, Mr Joseph Aloo in his welcome address, stated that the 2020 EndSars protest brought about the need for avenues for constructive youth engagement and interactions to be created.
He pointed out that the OGP would serve as one of such avenues; and applauded the Jos Green Centre for championing the cause and using the OGP to bring about constructive youth engagement with government.
The Deputy Country Director encouraged youths to key into the movement to make their voices heard.
The keynote addres was delivered by the Chief Technical Advisor, Programme Management and Results Delivery Office, Mr David Wuyep.
Wuyep was represented by the Programme Manager, Programme Management and Results Delivery office, Mr Geraldine Rimven.
He explained how the participation of youths in governance could become imperative for the attainment of social justice and egalitarianism.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Plateau joined OGP as part of the 2020 cohort. They are currently implementing five commitments from their 2021-2023 action plan.
This action plan features commitments related to open contracting, public participation, gender and extractive industries. (NAN)
