ECOWAS Volunteers Scheme to Unveil E-Platform
By E.K.Bensah Jr
Whoever said Africa
was not capable of managing its own affairs had yet to encounter the ECOWAS
Volunteers Scheme. To ECOWAS insiders, it’s the de facto “Marshall Plan” of
ECOWAS that seeks to uplift the Mano River Union countries embedded within ECOWAS
-- Liberia; Sierra Leone; Guinea-Bissau -- from extreme poverty. To others,
it’s a largely-unknown attempt to address the deep unemployment affecting the
youth across West Africa.
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| Bukola Ayoola is a former ECOWAS Volunteer |
For Bukola Ayoola,
Country Coordinator for Liberia of the ECOWAS Volunteers Scheme (EYVS) at the
Office of the Special Representative in Liberia, the opportunity for the ECOWAS
Volunteers Scheme to address youth unemployment is something she is very
passionate about.
Cutting an assuming
and humble figure, I first met her in Liberia for an ECOWAS meeting in January.
I was impressed by the wealth of experience she has, considering how she
started off herself as a Youth Volunteer back in 2011.
She believes it “was a
dream come true” as the platform not only improved her professional skills, but
also afforded her the opportunity to “interact with and meet the needs of young
people in one of the most vulnerable places in the ECOWAS Space -- Liberia” She
explains how throughout her seven years of professional volunteering, she has
had the opportunity of serving at different “strategic levels”, including as an
English teacher and Assistant to the ECOWAS Volunteers Programme.
I had yet-another
opportunity to meet Mz Ayoola today on the sidelines of the “Second Annual Forum
of National Volunteering Agencies in West Africa”, which was themed “Place of
Volunteering in the Fight Against Youth Unemployment”.
Pressing her on
whether the ECOWAS Volunteer’s Scheme would be expanded so as to be more
representative of skills outside the non-medical and educational sector (as had
been advertised a few weeks ago), she replied in the affirmative, explaining
how the expansion went to now even include UN agencies seconding their ads to
EYVS for them to advertise.
She explained that, an
ECOWAS Volunteer e-platform will be ready by next week, which will allow
national volunteer agencies within the sub-region to sign up.
Officially launched in
March 2010 to celebrate twenty years of ECOMOG’s first-ever intervention in
Liberia, the ECOWAS Volunteers Programme aims at injecting the skills and
expertise of volunteer citizens from the ECOWAS Community in cross-cutting
sectors of the interventions of the ECOWAS Commission.
When selected, the
Volunteers are deployed in selected government institutions, specialised
agencies and civil society organisations that are active in socio-economic,
cultural, political and humanitarian work outside their country of origin.
Since January 2017,
the programme has been extended to cover all ECOWAS Member States
ENDs
Emmanuel is a former Consultant for the West African Health
Organization. He is Deputy Coordinator of ECOWAS Journalists Network-Ghana; and
Managing-Director of Ecowas Business News. He is a former host &
executive-producer of “Africa in Focus” Show, which aired on Radio XYZ93.1fm.
**
(c) E K Bensah, 2018
Africa
in Focus Show seeks to demystify, unpack, and explain developments within
institutions of ECOWAS; the African Union; East Africa; & South-South
cooperation.First airborne in 2014, and with 5 Seasons under its belt, the Show
is known as a reference for quality analysis on Africa.
