SULAIMON OLANREWAJU reports that Kwara State government is addressing the challenge of skill gap, which has rendered many Nigerians unemployable, by equipping its youths with modern vocational training.

At a job creation summit organised by President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja, a while ago, Ngozi Anyogu, a Director at Dove-Ces Industries Nig. Limited, observed that “The unemployment situation in Nigeria is not demand-induced; it is supply induced. The quality of employable manpower is not there. The solution should come from building capacity and skills from the artisan areas. You don’t need research to know that most mechanics don’t fix your car well; you don’t need extensive research to know that your plumber is not doing a good job.

“You don’t need research to know that the electrician has done a wrong job. We all know it. We have the manpower but we have an acute shortage of skilled manpower. The only thing we need to do as a solution is that we need to retool or re-skill our people, whether they are youths or adults but particularly among the youths. Some of the youth are unemployed and unemployable because their parents too were unemployed and unemployable.”

Speaking in a similar vein at the recently concluded 25th Enugu International Trade Fair, the Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Wogu, said the fastest way for the country to record economic development was through skill acquisition.

His words, “Skill acquisition helps in creating self-employment. It is the antidote to unemployment and idleness among youths.”

Also at the 16th Annual Public Lecture of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management, former Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Niger Delta Development Commission and Chairman/CEO, Gladson Petrogas Limited, Mr. Godwin Omene, opined that “With a high population and numerous universities in Nigeria turning out thousands of graduates every year, there is no ready market to employ them.

“So, we must rely on the principle of self-determination. Young graduates and non-graduates should, therefore, embrace skills acquisition. Such skill acquisition should include but not limited to agriculture, computer training, wood technology, poultry, fish farming, hair salons, pedicure/manicure services, barbing salons, tailoring, etc.”

The views of the Kwara State government on solving the problem of unemployment in the country synchronise with those of experts who hold that vocational training for youth and the unemployed is the way out of the dilemma. Hence, the government has taken the issue of empowering its youths through skill acquisition seriously. However, the state did not just embark on skills acquisition programme because it is popular. According to Dr Muyideen Akorede, Senior Special Assistant to the Kwara State governor on Media and Communications, the decision of the government was borne out of a research.

His words, “When this government came in, one of the first things the governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed, did was to commission a survey of our youths. He wanted to know how many of them are unemployed, where they are based, what their skill sets are, their level of education and most importantly what they wanted to do with their lives.

“What the survey revealed was that we had youths who were looking for people to employ them. It was found out that some of the youth wanted to start businesses for which they had no skills. One of the things that also came out was that there was a middle level manpower gap. If you want to build a house, you will find out that your plasterer is from Ghana, your plumber is from the Republic of Benin, your electrician is from Togo and so on. So, there is a huge gap there. Even in other vocations; fashion designing, under-water welding and all that, it is the same thing.

“So, what we did was to contact the National Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA) to find out the key skills required for business. They came up with these skills we are talking about; fashion designing, under-water welding, masonry, plumbing and so many others. It was on that basis that we started the International Vocational Centre (IVC) to provide our youths with required skills, while also filling identified manpower gaps.”

He added that the products of the centre would be trained to be major drivers of local economy and employable anywhere in the world.

“To this end,” he said, “We have partnered with City and Guild to give our youths the required training so that they will be employable locally and internationally. We do not certify but we train them to be able to pass City and Guild examinations.

“The centre will run on a good mix of practical and theoretical learning with well-equipped classrooms and practical skill development areas such as under water welding, port operation, agriculture, hospitality, catering, engineering, construction and fashion designing, among others.

“Our focus is to, through modernised vocational training, premised on world-class standards, turn our youths into well-trained artisans, ready to create jobs and contribute to the collective prosperity of the state”.

The uniqueness of the youth empowerment programme through vocational training is that after graduating from the IVC, the trainees would be enrolled at any of the three incubation centres across the senatorial districts to upgrade their skills through exposure to more real life training.

After going through the second stage of training, the graduates are encouraged to form cooperatives through which they will be given access to credit to start their own businesses.    

Underscoring the importance Governor Ahmed attaches to youth empowerment, Akorede said, “The government has employed 5,000 youths so far. Two thousand of them are now permanently engaged as civil servants. With our Quick Win programme, we are going to engage an additional 8,200 this year alone. Of this number, more than a half will be entrepreneurs; they will be trained as entrepreneurs; either at the level of setting up their own businesses or at the level of going to train to be plumbers, electricians, mechanics etc. A lot of them, their minds are not even tuned to that. So, what we are going to do to encourage them is to pay them to be trained and also pay the trainers. And when they are through, they will be clustered into cooperatives and provided access to revolving credit so that as soon as they are done with their training, they can set up their own outfits. These people will form the vanguard of our efforts to re-orientate our youths away from looking for white collar jobs and focussing on setting up their own businesses, taking charge of their own destinies and even employing others.”

Akorede said the government recognised the importance of the informal sector in the growth and development of the economy, hence its resolve to strengthen that sector.

“The governor recognises that the informal sector is very vital to economic development everywhere. We recognise that and we are very keen on empowering that sector to make sure that the economy develops at that level,” Akorede said.

On what the government is doing to help the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), he said, “We are focussing on empowering SMEs. When the governor came in, his first intervention was for N250million revolving credit for cooperatives. As at the last count more than 30,000 small business owners had benefited from that. Once we finished with that, we moved to giving artisans N100million revolving credit to set up their own businesses. Just recently, we gave transporters another N50 million to buy taxis to boost their businesses. Cumulatively, the government has disbursed about N640million to small business owners across the state.”

With the strategy of strengthening the informal sector which Kwara State has deployed, experts agree that it has embarked on a journey to greatness and weaning itself from dependence on federal allocations.