A non-governmental organisation, Statecraft Foundation for Development Outcomes and Inclusion, has trained 90 youths from the six area councils of the Federal Capital Territory on leadership and development to promote civic participation.

The organisation’s Executive Director, Emmanuel Obiabo, made this known during a news briefing on Wednesday in Abuja.

The briefing was tagged, “Enhancing community youth associations for service delivery in FCT.’’

The project is being supported by the Nigeria Youth Futures Fund and implemented by LEAP Africa.

Mr Obiabo said, “The foundation is implementing the project with the goal of promoting active citizenship and leadership development in the FCT. As an important factor in facilitating good governance and service delivery, Statecraft Foundation is implementing the project. It underscores the need for youths to add their voices to reveal the root causes that have contributed to service delivery gaps in communities. This includes limited knowledge about development issues; insufficient civic participation of community members, and insufficient interface between the duty bearers and the populace. Through a series of localised training under the project, 90 targeted participants have been trained and inaugurated as community organisers.”

Mr Obiabo said the community organisers would champion the action plans developed from the training through a co-creation approach, for their respective identified and validated community needs.

He added that the disaggregation of the data of the participants into gender representation reflected the project’s sensitivity to the young demographics of the country whose future should be protected.

He said that 59 males and 21 females were reached within the ages of 18 to 29 years while 43 and 27 people between ages 30 to 35 years were also reached.

Programme Associate of Statecraft Foundation, Hikmah Siyanbola, listed some critical expectations of the project to include community needs assessment, youth engagement in addressing service delivery gaps, among others.

Ms Siyanbola said some of the communities they had worked in included Peyi, Pmabwara, Jigo, Rafin-Zurfi, Lanto, Ijah-Pada, Abattoir, Naharati, Sabo-Iddo, and Kunyami, all across the six area councils of FCT.

She said the needs of the communities ranged from bridges, post primary schools, access to pipe borne water, electricity, roads with drainages to control erosion, job opportunities and functional primary healthcare centres.

The Village Head of Kunyami community, Silas Agoy, represented by his Personal Assistant, Dnamizha Seth, said the community was in dire need of social amenities.

Mr Agoyi called for the establishment of primary healthcare centres, provision of electricity, other infrastructure and the upgrading of their village head to a District Head.

(NAN)