The Honourable Minister of State for Education ‘Hon. Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba’ played host to the National Steering Committee on Nigeria Youth Compact Covid-19 (NYCC-19) at the Federal Ministry of Education, Abuja.

The National Steering Committee (NSC) led by the chairman ‘Gambo Haruna’ delegated 7-man committee members for the courtesy visit to Minister of State for Education. The meeting started with an introductory section by Millicient Umoru Osakwa.

The National Chairman ‘Mr. Gambo Haruna’ gave a brief on the objectives of Nigerian Youth Compact on COVID-19 (NYCC-19).

According to him, Nigeria is the African country to domesticate youth compact on Covid-19 and about 1million youths are already registered on the NYCC-19 Platform.

In his statement, he said;

“the NYCC-19 is a domestication of the United Nation compact on humanitarian actions on Covid-19… the aim is to help government mitigate the spread of coronavirus and the impact of Covid-19 even in the post Covid”

“The youths make up 60% of the Nigerian Population and Nigerian Youth Compact on Covid-19 (NYCC-19) is aiming at partnering and supporting the Government towards mitigating the effect of Covid-19 in Nigeria”

“The NYCC-19 is therefore seeking for the support and the ministry’s backing to sensitize schools and universities on the risk of ignoring the Covid-19 guidelines” He added

However, the Vice chairman of the NYCC-19 ‘Prince Echem’ in his speech stated that the Nigerian Youths need to own this project and for this to be possible, the key sectors such as Ministry of Education have a role to play. Therefore, he solicited for the full support of the Ministry

In response, the Honourable Minister of State for Education ‘Hon. Chukwuemeka  Nwajiuba’ who is also a member of the Presidential Taskforce gave brief details of the objectives of Tasksforce. He believes there should be a national response and engagement.

However, he concurred to the necessity of risk communication across the grass root.

He said, “The biggest problem in Nigeria is risk communication. People need to understand that covid-19 affects people of all ages.”

According to him, the virus on its own doesn’t kill but when it comes in contact with the human body and underlying diseases, it kills.

The minister of state for Education highly commends and endorses the NYCC-19 for this laudable initiative and urge them to specify in clear terms the areas where the ministry can support them.