Business leaders to empower four million youths with N175b

Business leaders under the auspices of Coalition Against COVID (CA-COVID) are to create four million jobs within the next five years.

The private sector coalition said youths would be the biggest beneficiaries of the job windfall for which the businessmen plan to invest N175 billion.

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele told reporters at a CACOVID accountability meeting in Lagos on Wednesday that preliminary analysis showed unemployment, particularly among the youths, was a critical factor behind the #EndSARS protests.

With him at the conference were: Dangote Group Chairman Aliko Dangote; UBA Group Chairman Tony Elumelu and Access Bank Plc Group Managing Director Herbert Wigwe.

CACOVID was created by the Bankers’ Committee, comprising of banks and major private sector players to address the funding challenges faced by federal and state governments fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Emefiele, who chairs the Bankers’ Committee, said CA-COVID has committed to creating a high impact youth development programme that will provide technical and vocational education to over four million youths over the next five years.

He said: “Students will be trained on craftwork, plumbing, masonry, carpentry, and other artisanal related skills for which sufficient demand exist in Nigeria.

“Over N150 billion is expected to be deployed towards the set up and implementation of the youth development program, which will be available at select training centers across the country.”

Business leaders under the auspices of Coalition Against COVID (CA-COVID) are to create four million jobs within the next five years.

The private sector coalition said youths would be the biggest beneficiaries of the job windfall for which the businessmen plan to invest N175 billion.

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele told reporters at a CACOVID accountability meeting in Lagos on Wednesday that preliminary analysis showed unemployment, particularly among the youths, was a critical factor behind the #EndSARS protests.

With him at the conference were: Dangote Group Chairman Aliko Dangote; UBA Group Chairman Tony Elumelu and Access Bank Plc Group Managing Director Herbert Wigwe.

CACOVID was created by the Bankers’ Committee, comprising of banks and major private sector players to address the funding challenges faced by federal and state governments fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Emefiele, who chairs the Bankers’ Committee, said CA-COVID has committed to creating a high impact youth development programme that will provide technical and vocational education to over four million youths over the next five years.

He said: “Students will be trained on craftwork, plumbing, masonry, carpentry, and other artisanal related skills for which sufficient demand exist in Nigeria.

“Over N150 billion is expected to be deployed towards the set up and implementation of the youth development program, which will be available at select training centers across the country.”

Also, with the food relief programmes, CA-COVID provided palliatives in the form of essential food items to 1.7 million households, estimated at eight million Nigerians at N28.76 billion.

He said: “Indeed, owners of business premises desire a secure environment to conduct their legitimate businesses. We therefore seize this opportunity to once again, appeal to members of the private sector, who we will be calling on again, to rally round CA-COVID to secure not only our businesses but also our country.

“We also request the private sector to work with to operate under this platform which has been approved by Mr President.”

Dangote said the CA-COVID team will be working on establishing a database for artisans that benefit from the new training, to show organisation and professionalism in their work. He said building the database will reduce the risk of engaging the wrong people.

He said artisans doing plumbing, electrical works, tilers and bricklayers will benefit from the scheme.

“We all have repairs and with that data, you can know who to call for repairs. What we are doing is that we are providing them with money to buy tools.

“So, as soon as they get the training which is free, which we are paying for, then they have the guarantee that they get jobs,” Dangote said.

Continuing, he said Dangote Group has about 30,000 workers on its Lekki site. The target is to raise the workforce to 50,000.

According to him, between 25 to 28 per cent would be expatriates.

Wigwe noted that every transformation comes with its pain and hitches and that CA-COVID was created to intervene and protect the livelihood of people.

The Access Bank boss said: “The most important thing has to do with issues of employment. The pandemic and the lockdown created several problems.”

According to him, security is very important for the country because people outside the country always want to know how secured the country is before investing or visiting.

“All of us have a responsibility to make Nigeria succeed,” he said, adding that the CA-COVID initiative has brought enormous success to the people and helped in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic.

Elumelu said everyone has a role to play to move the country forward, adding that the COVID-19 and #EndSARS protests offer opportunities for all.