The Arewa Youths Consultative Forum on Friday vowed to reject whatever recommendations and resolutions that will come out of the ongoing National Conference because President Goodluck Jonathan and state governors single handedly handpicked their loyalists as delegates, rather than allowing the people to choose those to represent them.

The forum said the mode of selection of delegates has already discredited the conference and its outcome, since the delegates did not represent the interest of the larger number of Nigerians.

Addressing a press conference at the end of a two day special summit for northern youths and student leaders in Kaduna, President of the forum, Yerima Shettima frowned at the criteria of selecting delegates to the conference that saw the south allocated 272 delegates while the north had 220 despite its large land mass and population.

It therefore called for the conduct of a fresh and credible national conference that will reflect the interest of many Nigerians. It also added that the ongoing conference amounts to a brutal incursion into the sovereignty of the constitution that vests such powers in the National Assembly, while stating that those representing the north in the national conference betray true representation of the youths of the region as they don’t have the support of the generality of the people.

The youths also lamented on the poor state of education and high rate of poverty in the north, which it said was as result of bad leadership and indifference to genuine policies, programmes on agriculture and education.

On the security challenges confronting the north east and north central zones, the forum lamented the spate killing of innocent youths by security agents and Boko Haram sect members, while little or no action has been taken by present and past leaders of the region to address the problem.

Other issues raised by the forum is the disposition of the Independent National Electoral Commission(INEC) to conduct free and fair elections in 2015 and therefore wants the National Assembly to come up with a law for the reconstitution of an independent electoral body whose members would be elected through a referendum by the people ahead of the election.