Bahir Dar Hosts Symposium on 7th NNPs Day

Bahir Dar, December 7 (WIC) – Amid festivities to mark the seventh Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Day, Bahir Dar, seat of Amhara regional state, hosts national symposium on the values of the FDRE Constitution.Senior government officials, representatives of nations, nationalities and peoples of Ethiopia and students, held a discussion on a paper titled “Constitution, Democracy and Development in Ethiopia”. Presenting the paper, Dr Abraham Tekeste, state minister of finance and economic development, said: “The FDRE Constitution has addressed the age old pressing issues of nations, nationalities and peoples of Ethiopia and hence encouraging results in development and democratization have also been registered”.He said the country has managed to reduce the number of people living below the poverty line by 15.9 percent in 15 years. “This is indicative that Ethiopia is inline to meet the Millennium Development Goals to reduce poverty by half by 2015,” Dr Abraham said attributing the success to the system created by the FDRE Constitution.Speaking on the symposium, Bereket Simon, minister of Government Communications Affairs Office, said that the country has registered remarkable economic development in the last two decades.Over the past two decades we have come a long way in ensuring equality of nations, nationalities and peoples of Ethiopia as well as bringing about sustained economic growth, Bereket said. The Minister stressed the need to do more in terms of ensuring economic and political participation of the youth, women and pastoral communities.Some participants of the symposium told WIC that the symposium details the significance of the constitution as a basis for Ethiopia’s democracy and development. The participants maintained the need to work together to identify challenges so as to sustain the positive gains the FDRE Constitution brought to the country..Waltainfo.com