Distinguished Youth of Ikorodu Division,
I wish us a Happy International Youth Day.
You will agree with me that, what we celebrate today is aimed at giving us an opportunity to celebrate and mainstream young peoples’ voice, actions, initiatives as well as our meaningful, universal and equitable engagement.
This year’s theme “Youth Engagement for Global Action” seeks to highlight the ways in which the engagement of young people at the local, national and global levels is enriching national and multilateral institutions, processes as well as draw lessons on how our representation and engagement in formal institutional politics can be significantly enhanced.
Ever dynamic youth of our prestigious Ikorodu Division of Lagos State, it is pertinent we truly draw lessons on how our representation and engagement has unlocked youthful potentials in the division since installation as your Youth Ambassadors in a couple of months spent in the office (Precisely 9 Months).
We started the Administration with an SDG’s Activation since the Sustainable Development Goals are global goals designed to help transform our world.
For us, it is pertinent we join forces with the UN so as to achieve a better and more sustainable future for everyone in Ikorodu.
We proceeded in our leadership with a Youth Dialogue where representatives from various youth groups in Ikorodu came together to outline the problems and collectively proffer solutions and went further to map out a way forward to achieving it.
The dialogue gave birth to numbers of other projects executed by the Ambassadors and some were in partnership with the youth groups.
Considering how rampant some of our youth in the division are living life perilously, the Ikorodu Ambassadors came together to organise a Secondary School Outreach, Tagged; Risk Embedded in Living Dangerously where Drug abuse, Cultism, Indecent Dressing, Exam Malpractice, Hooliganism and others were the key focus of discussions, the Ambassadors and numbers of volunteers, as well as youth groups, came together to deliver the young ones from living dangerously.
Shortly after that, the Global pandemic began, we had no choice than to embrace the new normal, and amidst heightened difficulty, we prevailed.
The Ambassadors proceeded in training over 250 youth on a virtual Skills Acquisition, Tagged; Enable Master Class where Business Plan, Etiquette, Good manners and Social Skills, Graphics Design as well as Digital Marketing were acquired by our youths during the COVID 19 lockdown.
We then moved into the May Mental Awareness Campaign, a campaign initiated in order to lend a voice to the mental illness.
Since learning they say is a continuous process, the Ambassadors partnered with Atlas initiative on a Four (4) weeks training on 3D Epoxy Art, Life Skills, Social Inclusion, Civic Participation and Active Citizenship.
And to commemorate the International Youth Day, the Ambassadors in partnership with Radiance Niche will today, embark on a Learn With Notebooks Project donations of over 3,000 learning materials to children in the division, this will start today 12th and end on 18th of August 2020.
The service has not been easy, but we keep drawing strength and support from our notable and ever ready Ministry of Youth and Social Development in our state, Lagos State.
Conclusively, as we keep building a bigger table, today we join trillions of youth in celebrating the youth day in discussions that are hosted by youth for youth.
We implore every youth to join the State Leadership in the campaign of ensuring the voice of the youth are heard and are better recognised as a key stakeholder to National Development.
Create your own Youth Campaign DP: https://getdp.co/Youthcampaigndp
Once again, I wish us a meaningful youth engagement for global action.
#YouthEngage
#YouthInclusion
#GlobalAction
#InternationalYouthDay
Regards,
HIS YOUTHFULNESS,
AMB. Jackson Adewale AYIKA
Ikorodu Division Youth Ambassador, Lagos State Ministry of Youth and Social Development
