The National Directorate of Employment (NDE) in Bauchi state has graduated 538 youths trained in various entrepreneurial skills in the state.
Mr Nasiru Argungu, the Director General of NDE, said at the graduation ceremony in Bauchi on Saturday, the exercise was designed to provide employment opportunities for youths, especially from poor households.
Argungu, who expressed satisfaction with the way the training was carried out, revealed that it was a collaboration among the NDE, World Bank and the state government.
“I am very impressed with what I have seen, especially in terms of the training, their feeding but I want improvement on their accommodation.
“I have spoken with the people in charge of the need to see improvement next time; we are going for another circle so that the place can be very comfortable for participants to concentrate on what they are learning.
“This training is a collaboration of NDE, World Bank and the state government. Ours is to train; theirs is to take over from us, in terms of resettlement and we will put so much pressure on them to do that,” Argungu said.
Argungu also added that NDE in 2019, rather than embarking on full scale training of youths in the country, would concentrate more on resettlement.
“This year, what we are going to concentrate on is resettlement, not training . We are going to resettle as many as we can,” the NDE boss said.
He, however, promised that the graduands would start receiving alerts of their stipend and transportation allowances from Sunday.
Muhammed Abdullahi, on behalf of others, commended the Federal Government and NDE for initiating the programme.
He said it would help in reducing the over dependence of youths on white collar jobs.
TBI Africa.com said that the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that some of the acquired skills includes bricks and blocks making, carpentry and joinery, tailoring and dress making, pipe fitting and plumbing.
Others are spices making, block making, hairdressing and pedicure, photographic work, computer operation, satellite and dish installation.
