The Agricola/McDoom community on Saturday welcomed the opening of its first basketball court and pavilion, which was built under the Rapid Impact Project, a feature of the Community Action Component (CAC) of the Guyana-IDB Citizens Security Programme.
At the commissioning ceremony, Minister of Home Affairs Clement Rohee said ideally, the programme should’ve been developed in all 10 regions to enhance the lives of youth, but due to limited resources, it selected 10 communities in regions Four and Six to build a recreational facility.
To this end, the Education, Labour and Culture, Youth and Sport ministries and the police and defence forces conduct life improvement programmes from their budgetary allocations. According to a report from the Govern-ment Information Agency (GINA), over 120 youths from the Agricola/McDoom area have already benefited from skills, vocational training and personal development programmes such as conflict resolution and violence prevention, all of which were offered under the CAC.
The skills training programme was tailored to meet the needs of a specific group of youth while the violence prevention programme was more broad-based and included the whole neighbourhood.
“This is another contribution, modest as it is, to making Agricola a safe neighbourhood. Much more has to be done, a task that this government is committed to, but we need the involvement of more stakeholders,” Rohee said. The minister also presented a number of basketballs and other gear to sport clubs in Agricola and its environs.
Residents were thankful for the gesture, which they saw as another step toward fostering development in their community.
They have already been actively engaging the business community and other public-spirited citizens for funds to install other amenities at the court.
The land on which the facility now stands was acquired with support from Mayor Hamilton Green, who urged the community to make full use of it and undertake projects that will cultivate moral development.
