FG committed to empowering youths

chika ebuzor

October 15, 2015 9:10 AM

The director said that the ministry’s skills acquisition centres in the nine oil producing states of the Niger Delta were nearing completion.

Mrs. Godiya Yohanna, the Director, Community and Youth Empowerment, Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs, said on Wednesday that the ministry was committed to empowering youths in the region.

Yohanna reaffirmed the ministry’s commitment in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja.

She explained that the training of youths from the Niger Delta was a continuous exercise designed to create employment for the non-militant ones from the region.

According to her, no fewer than 160,000 youths have applied for the skill acquisition programme in 2015.

She said that the programme would encourage the youths to be employers of labour, adding that the ministry was prepared to enable more youths from the region to acquire skills locally and internationally.

''Our mandate is to work towards useful self-employment, so that beneficiaries would not have to look for employment afterwards.

''The idea is for them to be self-employed in order to promote the economy of the region.''

chika ebuzor