By Lamarana S. Jallow
The management of the Ministry of Youth and Sports (MoYS) recently received in audience Prof. Momodou Sallah, Director of the Centre for Academic Innovation at De Montfort University in the United Kingdom who is also the Strategic Director of the Catalyst Academy in The Gambia.
The visit was meant to build partnership with the Ministry and explore possible areas of cooperation in skills acquisition, sport and recreation facility development, as well as entrepreneurship to equip citizens, most especially youth and women.
In his welcome remarks, Honourable Bakary Y. Badjie, Minister of Youth and Sports, commended Professor Sallah for the initiative and expressed hope that the new partnership will boost the capacity of young people in The Gambia in skill acquisition, and create employment for socio-economic development.
He also emphasised the need to build the capacity of youth workers and other policy makers in dealing with youth matters.
For her part, Ms.Ndey Marie Njie, Permanent Secretary, MoYS thanked Professor Sallah for coming up with such initiative to complement government’s efforts. “These are the initiatives we as a government want to associate ourselves with,” she noted.
She reminded the audience that the necessary structures to implement the ideas are available within the Ministry, citing institutions like the National Youth Service Scheme (NYSS) , President International Award (PIA) and National Enterprise Development Initiative (NEDI) as training providers.
Prof. Momodou Sallah thanked the Ministry for receiving him and made a power point presentation on how his institution intends to work with the Ministry to bring more opportunities to young people and women of the country.
He said their initiative represents a unique combination of work to equip global citizens, especially young people and women, with the conceptual and practical tools to thrive in an increasingly globalised world.
Prof. Sallah told the senior management that his intention is to introduce transformative education for young people through delivery of modular youth work programmes, providing accredited awards, delivery of residential training courses, providing joint learning with international peers and delivery of preparation for employment courses.
