SURE-P to graduate 5,075 Nigerians on Technical and Vocational Skills Acquisition Programme TVET.

JOS (SURE-P Report) - The Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment Programme SURE-P would soon graduate over 5,075 Nigerians who are currently undergoing client-based training in different entities by SURE-P Technical and Vocational Skills Acquisition Programme TVET. The Chairman of SURE-P, Martin Luther Agwai (General Rtd) disclosed this at the commissioning of the Federal Ministry of Labour Training Center in Bauchi and the Industrial Training Fund Centre in Jos recently.

Martin Agwai, who was represented by the Programme Technical Adviser on TVET, Olukayode Soremekun stated that additional skills training effort is being planned to impact more than 5,000 beneficiaries, saying candidates who have indicated interest in the portal will be matched with trainers and training institutions across the country. He stressed that the ability to continue with the provision of adequate and appropriate training for the teeming youths is critical; indicating that some form of sustainability needs to be put in place. The Minister of Labour and Productivity, Emeka Nwogu urged the youths to take advantage of these centers and demanded the youths in the North East particularly to embrace the training.

“This is better than taking to insurgency and other activities which are inimical to the growth of this region. This is a presidential programme aimed at redirecting the youths to become responsible in the future. “Great people are going to be trained here. Great leaders are going to be trained here and it will be to the advantage of Bauchi people and Nigeria,” he stated. Adding, with its present capacity, the center would train over 3,000 youths every year. 

While speaking, the Principal of the school, Jatau, who is the organizer of the programme disclosed that the center has trained about 3,129 artisans between 2009 and 2013. “With the expansion of the center by TVET, the center will be having the capacity to train about 668 trainees in about eleven trades which translate to over 3,000 jobs created by the center within the period,” he said. The Principal requested SURE-P to provide a 32 sitter bus for industrial visits and also absorb the present set of instructors on permanent basis.

The Director-General of the Industrial Training Fund Center of Excellence in Jos, Juliet Chukkas, who was represented by Joseph Ari noted that the center has trained over 37,000 youths across the country in the last one year. She added that the center is planning to train 2million Nigerians annually. “The mandate of the TVET component of SURE-P is to reduce unemployment and poverty in Nigeria through development training, skills acquisition,  institutional capacity building and investing in technical/vocational training infrastructure,” she said.