The Senate Leader, Senator Opeyemi Bamidele, has trained 1,900 youths and women in vocational and entrepreneurial training to uplift their economic potential.
Bamidele, who made this known on Wednesday, said the effort was an attempt to tackle unemployment and abject poverty in Ekiti state.
The Senator representing Ekiti Central Senatorial District said the endemic joblessness and the attendant poverty in the country can only be tackled headlong with individuals partnering the government to expose the vast youth population to vocational training that can make them self-reliant.
The Federal Lawmaker stated this in Ado Ekiti, on Wednesday, at the closing session of a three-day vocational and entrepreneurial programme, organised for the youth and women in Ekiti Central Senatorial District.
The Federal Lawmaker, represented by a Senior Legislative Assistant, Bunmi Oguntuase, said the areas of focus in the trainings are: Make Up and Barbing, Leather Works, Fashion Designing, Confectionary, Hairdressing, Soap Making and Agriculture.
Senator Bamidele assured that the participants will not only be exposed to relevant training to acquire skills to thrive in their areas of interest but would also get the requisite inputs to kickstart their businesses.
He said the dearth of white collar jobs in the country has made it expedient for Nigerian citizens to embrace vocation and entrepreneurial exposures that can make them overcome the challenge of poverty in the system.
He saluted those who drafted the country’s education curricular, who are fasting adjusting to the current reality, with the introduction of vocational and entrepreneurial courses in the tertiary institutions to make the graduates well equipped to operate under a sophisticated 21st century economy.
“We are doing this to help our youths and women who are the most hit by the scourges of unemployment and poverty. The few white collar jobs we have can’t serve all the youths, they need to be given the right exposure, skills and other support to operate and contribute to economic development.
“This might not be enough to go around, but gradually we are providing the platform to lend the required help that can help the system. Unemployment is directly connected with the upsurge in crimes in our society, and for us to overcome this, we must do what we ought to do as leaders to make our youth productive.
“We have various sections or interests, they shall be trained based on whichever they picked. And at the end of it all, we will encourage the beneficiaries so that they can start off their own businesses.”
Speaking at the event, one of the trainers and consultants with Akgen Solutions Limited, Akanni Sanni, said the programme is expected to have a positive multiplier effect on the economy of the state within the next 12 months.
Akanni added that Senator Bamidele conceptualized the training in view of the spiralling unemployment rate and how best to salvage the youth and women population from the throes of poverty.
“You know what poverty can bring to the society: death, crime and lack of self worth. But with this training, people can acquire the right exposure and backing to operate on their own and help in the growth of the local economy.”
On the significance of the training, Sanni said: “For you to be an entrepreneur, you need training, you need the right skills, and that is exactly what the Senator is providing.
“Within the shortest possible time, these beneficiaries we start operating, we expect a positive multiplier and developmental impact. Money won’t come when you can’t add value.
“You just have to provide services and goods for you to earn money, you must learn before earning. This is the new philosophy.”
