SMEDAN to train women, returnees from South Africa

The Chairman/CEO of the Nigerian in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM) Abike Dabiri-Erewa has called on the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN) to help build the capacity of women and people who returned from South Africa as a result of the xenophobic attacks.

Erewa was speaking yesterday when he paid a courtesy visit to the Director General of SMEDAN, Dr Umaru Dikko Radda at the agency’s headquarters in Abuja yesterday.

“We want to appeal to SMEDAN to collaborate with you on the skills acquisition programme they returnees can do to reintegrate into the society. We received a total of 485, airlifted back to Nigeria, and quite a number of them are women and minors. So we want to appeal to you to see any partnership we can have with you in terms of capacity building for the people that are coming back. “She said.

The DG of SMEDAN, Dr Umaru Dikko Radda said the agency will provide Business Development Support and training to the women and the other returnees as soon as a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) is signed with the Diaspora Commission.

“We have people ready to provide this training for the women and other returnees. Also, we facilitate access to finance through the Development Banks of Nigeria. And the CBN has a window now that if the people are trained by SMEDAN , they can access funding from one million to 10 million. This is one of the windows that if we work with CBN, these people can be given priority. I think you can discuss with CBN governor so that after they are trained by us, that special recognition can be given to them to access the fund, so that they can start and new life,” Radda said.