The united youth association (UYA), recently concluded its first ever week long youth conference on the theme “capacitate young people for positive social change”, at the Bakau Newtown Lower Basic School. The youth conference, funded by the national aids secretariat (NAS), brought together over sixty young people from three sub-branches of the association, and its aims, among others things, to capacitate young people on pertinent issues such as HIV/AIDS awareness, reproductive health, child right, among a host of other social issues impeding the growth and development of young people.

During the course of the youth conference, participants embarked on wide ranging activities geared towards capacitating them on issues unknown to them. Prominent among these were a two-day NAS capacity building workshop on HIV/AIDs preventions, its causes and mode of transmission.

During the course of this NAS HIV/AIDS workshop, fifty-one members of the association underwent voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), administered by the GFPA’s new world for youth (NEWFOY). A community outreach sensitization program on HIV/AIDS awareness issues, particularly voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), was also carried out by participants in different areas of Bakau community.

Other activities conducted during the youth conference included a two day sensitization classes on sexual and reproductive health issues, conducted by NEWFOY; character education, conducted by the service for peace (SFP), inter-branches completion on teenage pregnancy and drug abuse as well as a cleansing exercise of public places within the Kanifing municipality.

Speaking to youth matters, Musa Conteh, Chairman of the organization, said that his association was formed by students and non-students within Bakau Newtown and its environs in 2005. And, according to him, the aims and objectives of his association, among other, were to engage young people in an organized group in the quest to address pertinent issues such as; child rights promotion and related issues, HIV/AIDS awareness, as well as to empower each other in areas of education, in order to eradicate illiteracy among young people.

“We also engage in activities such as discouraging young people from the use of abusive drugs, educate its members on reproductive health issues as well as to foster unity among them”, he said.

Chairman Conteh described the youth conference as successful, noting that his members were adequately informed and exposed to critical issues affecting the young. He used the opportunity to commend the national AIDS secretariat (NAS) for funding the youth conference, and the child protection alliance (CPA) and new world for youth (NEWFOY), for their genuine partnership.