Stakeholders in labour and employment matters on Friday urged Nigerian youths to focus their attention on skills acquisition as major means of earning a living.
The stakeholders, including the director general of Michael Imoudu Institute For Labour Studies (MINILS), Ilorin, Comrade Issa Aremu and a deputy director at the National Directorate of Employment (NDE), Mr G.O Kudabo made the call in Ilorin, Kwara State.
Aremu and Kudabo spoke during the celebration of International Youths Skills Day organised by MINILS.
Aremu enjoined the youths in attendance to take advantage of the institute’s Skills Acquisition Centre to train themselves and become self- employed and employers of labour upon graduation.
“We have put in place the skills acquisition centre to train youths in various vocations to help Nigeria solve the problems of unemployment. We shall make the International Day of Youth a daily affair,” Aremu stated.
Also speaking, the NDE deputy director in Kwara, Kudabo,urged the youths to take advantage of the agency’s skill acquisition programmes.
He said the youths can get themselves employed through the learning of various arts, including tieying of headgears (gele).
In his goodwill message, the president, Kwara Chambers of Commerce, Industry,Mines and Agriculture (KWACCIMA), Fatai Ayodimeji, said the theme for this year’s celebration” Transforming Youth Skills For The Future” is apt.
“ We are today in an era where youths because of unemployment or under employment devote a lot of their energies and skills to unproductive and unimaginable negative endeavours, thus it is time to transform these energies and skills to decent work and entrepreneurship.
“ We must therefore evolve strategic ways to equip them with the required skills for gainful employment, decent and meaningful vocations and entrepreneurship,” Ayodimeji said.
