He observed that it was necessary to create an enabling environment for displaced persons, including refugees, to live their dreams.

“The spectre of tens and tens of millions of young refugees growing up without the needed skills to create meaningful lives for themselves is a dangerous one. What do we expect them to do? What opportunities are available to them? How competitive can they be in this global economy? These are questions that must elicit a concerted and calculated response from world leaders,” the President, who is also the Co-Chair of Advocates for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), said. 

He observed that education was the key to human development and widening life's options for individuals and society as a whole, adding that it was the hope of every parent that education would help his or her children escape poverty and give them access to a good life.

Plight

He lamented the plight of the 66 million people displaced globally, out of which 23 million were described as refugees.

“The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), in a report, notes that ‘refugees are five times more likely to be out of school than the global average. Only 50 per cent of refugee children have access to primary education, compared with a global average of more than 90 per cent’,” he said when he delivered the keynote address at the 2017 World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE), in Doha, Qatar.

Referring to the same report, the President stated that the gap in access to education widened as “these children become older, with only 22 per cent of refugee adolescents attending secondary school, compared to a global average of 84 per cent. At the higher education level, less than one per cent of refugees attend university, compared to 34 per cent at global level’”.

The summit is on the theme: “Asset over burden – Education for refugee youth”.

The WISE Summit is an annual gathering of diverse educational stakeholders in Doha to explore and share ideas and collaborate towards creative action in education.

At WISE, teachers, decision makers and influential experts from all fields of the public and private sector gather in a collegial environment to harness their experience in addressing evolving educational challenges.

Read also: ECG disconnects Ashanti GBC over GH¢ 1.75 million debt

Empowerment

As co-Chair of the 2030 UN SDG Advocates Group of Eminent Personalities, the President stated that if the noble goals of the SDGs were to ensure that no one was left behind and guarantee education for all, then the world must seek to empower those left behind as a result of conflict and war.

“We should commit ourselves to building a world where every child has the opportunity to better himself or herself and, by so doing, better the global community,” he said.

Read also: 4 Containers impounded at Tema Port for evading tax

Africa must industrialise

With Africa having the world’s second fastest economic growth rate, the world's fastest-growing region for foreign direct investment and in possession of nearly 30 per cent of the earth's remaining mineral resources, President Akufo-Addo said, it was disheartening to find that African youth did not see a future in their respective countries and were willing to cross the Sahara Desert on foot and drown in the Mediterranean Sea in a desperate bid to reach the mirage of a better life in Europe.

The UN Refugee Agency figures show that last year, 3,740 lives were lost on the Mediterranean, 31 short of the 3,771 reported for 2015, as desperate young people try to escape from the economic hardship on the continent.

President Akufo-Addo attributed the situation to the structure of the majority of African economies, which were dependent on the production and export of raw materials.

He explained that such economies could not produce wealth and prosperity for the masses on the continent.

“It, therefore, drives the determination to seek a much better standard of living out of Africa, thereby fuelling the refugee crises and the numerous counts of illegal migrations.

 “What the evidence from history and the experience of many countries have shown is that it is not natural resources that build nations. It is people who build nations. It is not gold, cocoa, diamonds, timber or oil that are going to build Africa. If it were, it would have done so already. It is Africans, especially the youth of today, who are going to build Africa,” he said.

It is for this reason, he told the gathering, that Ghana, under his administration, had placed much premium on education, leading up to the introduction of the free SHS policy.

“All this is being done because we want to throw open the doors of opportunity and hope to our young people and help build a new African civilisation governed by the rule of law, respect for individual liberties and human rights and the principles of democratic accountability, which will provide the basis for the new Africa of prosperity and dignity, no longer dependent on aid or charity,” President Akufo-Addo stressed.