2022 Mid-Year Budget Review: Government to Terminate NABCO Effective September 1

The government has given notice of its plan to discontinue the Nation Builders Corps (NABCO) programme from September 1, 2022, allowing trainees to explore opportunities elsewhere, including government-supported initiatives such as the YouStart Initiative.

The program was supposed to run for three years and then be restarted with new recruits, but it was extended after the third year ended.

At the 2022 Mid-Year Budget Review, Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, announced that the programme that was launched in August 2018 will be completed by September 1, 2022, paving the way for interested personnel to subscribe to the YouStart Initiative and other existing programmes.

According to the Finance Minister, the NABCO programme, which has enjoyed some GHC 2.2 billion of investment, has prepared young graduates for the world of work, adding that some of them can take advantage of other government-backed opportunities such as the YouStart Initiative.

“As they exit, the current cohort on the programme are encouraged to take advantage of the YouStart initiative and other existing programmes in our drive to build an entrepreneurial nation. The government’s policy is to support dynamic young entrepreneurs to access training and funds to build their businesses and become a significant pool of job providers for their fellow young people, “he stated.

There have been several months of agitation by NABCO personnel, primarily over the non-payment of monthly allowances, with some calling on the NABCO secretariat to regularize their employment.

On Monday, the NABCO Trainees Association of Ghana noted that it will be organizing a press conference on July 29th, 2022 to register their angst at the government’s refusal to pay their monthly stipends for about nine months, resulting in unbearable hardships for its members while keeping their employment status in limbo.

The Nation Builders Corps (NABCO) program was a government initiative to address graduate unemployment and solve social problems. The focus of the initiative was to solve public service delivery problems in health, education, agriculture, technology, and governance and to drive revenue mobilization and collection. Under the programme, graduates will be trained, equipped with the necessary work tools and deployed around the country to engage in a variety of revenue-generating programmes including: Educate Ghana, Heal Ghana, Feed Ghana, Revenue Ghana, Digitize Ghana. Civic Ghana and Enterprise Ghana.