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President John Dramani Mahama says African countries need to lessen the inequality between their people to avoid conflicts and upheavals within the countries. He said as the economies grew, some people unfortunately were left behind in the development process, pushing them sometimes to take up arms against the established order because they found no future in the state. President Mahama stated this at a high level meeting to discuss the African Development Bank (AfDB) commissioned report on fragile African States, in Brussels, Belgium Tuesday. The report wanted specific states that had been classified as fragile states to be rather classified as natural risk states within the development process. Economic growth "When the economy begins to accelerate, you begin to see a wide gap between the richest segment of the society and the poorer segment "When you get additional oil and gas, you are likely to see the billionaires and you are likely to see people who are in the boondocks," he said. Mr Mahama, therefore, stressed the need for interventions to provide the proper safety nets to protect the poor and the vulnerable. The Ghana situation Turning to Ghana, Mr Mahama said various measures put in place had helped to strengthen the local assemblies to tackle development based on the needs of the people. In that case, he mentioned the District Assemblies Common Fund, which had over the years supported the assemblies to spread out infrastructure projects in the local communities. Mr Mahama also mentioned direct support for democratic institutions such as parliament and the judiciary to enable them undertake their constitutional duties without any interference. Youth employment The President said African nations must see the need to make jobs available for the youth. He said as large numbers of the youth come out of school every year, it remains critical for job avenues to be created for them. �So we need to engage the youth so that hey don't get engaged by the devil in social deviance and other such areas,� he added. With the Brussels meeting coming close to the just-ended ECOWAS meeting where he was elected chairman, President Mahama said, "For us, the new horizon we must push and push firmly is to integrate our economies." "I believe we have a better chance of growing comparatively in all our countries if we have a more integrated market in West Africa where we are able to move goods and people easily across our countries than when we do things in isolation in our individual countries .� he said.