The 28th annual Ijtema (convention) of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’at youth was held recently at Masroor Senior Secondary School in Old Yundum from 23rd to 25th December 2011.
The convention was organized by the Majlis Khuddamul Ahmadiyya (male youth wing) of the Jama’at in The Gambia.
The convention attracted hundreds of youths from across the country and Guinea Bissau, and discussed contemporary social and spiritual issues affecting them.
Seapking on the occasion, Kawsu Fadera a representative of the Minister of Youth Sheriff Gomez, said youths are the fundamental pillars on which a nation’s future progress and prosperity is built on.
He said for any nation to prosper both economically and socially, she must have a productive and vibrant youthful population as a major engine of growth of the development process.
Fadera a senior secretary at the Ministry of Youth and Sports further noted that it has been evident, based on research, that the world’s industrial nations have made huge investment in the entrepreneurial skills of their youths.
He said that the youth of The Gambia constitute a significant proportion of the driving force needed for our socio economic development.
“We cannot enhance their full participation in this process without investment in the appropriate knowledge, skills and technologies to enable us to overcome their development challenges and responsibilities.”
Fadera went on to explain that it is strictly in line with the government policy for the youth development that the association of the Ahmadi youths, in particular this convention, has planned, focus and set the direction to enhance the entrepreneurial skills and competence of its youths.
He said that the government of the Gambia has regarded youths as effective aggregates of national development through entrepreneurship, self-reliance and employability.
Brother Tahir Ahmad Touray, Sadr National President, in his keynote address, advanced that what is not attained in the age of the youth is hardly attained later, and the Allah Almighty has endowed us immeasurable power.
Bro Tahir preached that every second of our lives must be meaningfully spent, because every subtracted second from our live means an increase of speed toward the grave.
