The National Directorate of Employment (NDE), on Friday in Asaba, the Delta State capital, flagged off the skill acquisition training in vocational, agricultural, entrepreneurial, transient jobs and activities in the public work sector.
As part of the training, NDE will training 93,731 unskilled and unemployed persons across Nigeria under the renewed hope employment initiative. Of this number, a total of 1,930 will be trained in Asaba.
In a keynote address, Director-General of the NDE, Silas Ali Agara described the training exercise as a mile stone for the directorate in its fight against unemployment which at the heart of the agency’s founding mandate, just as it aligns with President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Employment Initiative.
The current employment initiative, he continued, was designed to train beneficiaries in 30 skill sets across the NDE’s four core programmes of Vocational Skills Development, Small Scale Enterprises, Rural Employment Promotion and Special Public Works.
Various categories of the unskilled and unemployed in the country, Agara continued, “have been provided for within the framework of the programme such as school leavers, school dropouts, women, graduates of tertiary institutions, retirees and persons with special needs among others.
“After the training, a good number of the beneficiaries will be resettled into productive entrepreneurial lives through the provision of tools, equipment and startup capital.
“However, those that we are not able to resettle will be linked with credit granting institutions for further support,” he added.
The DG, who was represented by Jinanwa Chukwuma, Director, NDE South-South Zone, assured that the agency under his watch “has ensured the adoption of cutting edge technology in the design and execution of this programme.
“For instance, all applicants registered through our online portal which has enabled us to establish for the first time, a credible database of our beneficiaries and a very good number of our youths/ beneficiaries will be trained on information and communication technology (ICT).
“This is a deliberate step by the NDE in order to equip our youths with emerging skills that will enable them become globally competitive,” he stressed.
He recalled that the NDE had over the years tackled unemployment in the country, sensitising, counselling, de-radicalization and reorienting the minds of unemployed youths to de-emphasize “the search for non-existent white collar jobs and embrace skill acquisition as a deliberate choice for self-reliance and effective contributor into the socio economy of the nation.
”He appreciated the Minister of Labour and Employment, Mallam Muhammad Maigeri Dingyadi, and the Minister of State, Nkeiruka Onyejiocha, who is the Supervising Minister of the NDE, for supporting and providing an enabling environment for the agency to discharge its mandate creditably.
Agara assured “Nigerians that the lessons we take away from this programme will enable us to improve on subsequent initiatives.”
Welcoming the participants and facilitators earlier, the NDE State Director, Mrs. Omoku Edith, appreciated the DG for approving the flag-off of such programmes nationwide.
She also appreciated the Permanent-Secretary, Ministry of Youths Development, Dr. Ngozi Mogbolu, urging the trainees to count themselves fortunate to be among the chosen few and to take the opportunity seriously.
“This is an opportunity that will help you acquire skills and make you self- employed, sustaining and reliant in the future,” Omoku stressed.
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