Report by Nana POKU
The Executive Director of the National Service Scheme has called all graduates of the scheme to partake in its Golden Jubilee grand Celebration.
Mr Osei Assibey made this appeal when he took his turn to speak about his outfit in the series of press conferences called ‘State Of Affairs In The State Agencies’ at the Ministry of Information in Accra.
Mr Osei Assibey enumerated the significant role the Scheme has played in nation-building from NRCD 1973. The decree was later re-promulgated into an Act of Parliament in 1980 under the 3rd Republican constitution.
He indicated that the service has ten specific areas it has assisted for the past 49 years. The CEO intimated that judging from the role the Scheme has played it calls for a real grandiose celebration from all people who have passed through the system.
From the President to every graduate in the country, he asked all to show appreciation for the role the Service has played in their lives.
It also came out that the Scheme is contemplating going autonomous by being made an Authority in the coming years. According to him right now because they are not an Authority there are some decisions they cannot take. For instance, they cannot join other companies to form Joint Ventures, Do Commercial Ventures, and access loans from banks to expand their tentacles to generate more revenues to situate the scheme on firm ground. This is because it is increasingly apparent that the numbers are ballooning and it ‘needs support because government alone cannot shoulder it’. For instance, plans are afoot to embark on large scale commercial farming, ICT, Business Ventures, etc. “As I speak a lot of organizations have expressed their readiness to join hands or support the Service but once it’s a nonprofit making organization they are not prepared to bring in their money. I hope parliament passes the bill of autonomy so we stand to bring on board many companies to partner us in future”.
The Executive Director told the journalists gathered that the scheme has in its repository a lot of different backgrounds that has inured to the growth of some of these organizations. He called for the use of ICT and technology in the transaction in the scheme to avoid ‘ghost names’ and to ensure proper documentation and registration processes.
