Skills Acquisition: World Bank Partners Ogun to Train 10,000 Youths

The Ogun State Government is set to partner the World Bank to train not less than 10,000 youths in different types of trade while reviving all the State Technical Colleges.

Planned under the state’s Skills Fund Project of the State Economic Transformation Project (OGSTEP) office, is to improve economic livelihood and enhance productivity among citizens.

The immediate past Commissioner for Budget and Planning Mr. Olaolu Olabimtan, disclosed the state’s effort, during an interview with journalists.

He said the project was set up as an initiative to support technical and vocational skills in the state, towards the production of skilled and employable youths and to check lack of adequate skilled manpower in workplaces.

Olabimtan said that the project would be executed by people of integrity as Board of Trustees, to ensure that the fund is separated from normal government budgetary systems in order to achieve transparency and sustainability.

The former commissioner explained that the selection process for the skills fund would be community-based, though in a very competitive manner.

He posited it was high time the society desist from celebrating individuals with questionable sources of wealth, rather, encourage hard work, diligence and the acquisition of skills.

Speaking on the project, the immediate past Commissioner for Education, Science and Technology, Prof. Abayomi Arigbabu, noted that the government cannot employ everybody as civil servants and has therefore provided a means of empowering them and making them employers of labour themselves.

He noted that the skills acquisition programme is well-structured and technologically driven unlike the traditional skills acquisition method.

He therefore, called on parents of interested learners from Junior Secondary School (JSS 3) not to discourage their children and wards from attending the State Technical Colleges as the certification from the colleges would be recognised by creditable bodies and they would still have the opportunity of proceeding to universities or polytechnics in order to be more academically inclined if desired.