NIGER DELTA: FG VOTES ADDITIONAL N1BN FOR NON-MILITANT YOUTHS

The federal government yesterday approved nearly N1 billion for the training of 2700 non- militant Niger Delta youth.
This is coming as the nation had already expended over $1 billion (about N158 billion) on amnesty program for the militants in the region. Special Adviser to the president on Media and Publicity, Reuben Abati, while briefing newsmen after the weekly Executive Council of the Federation meeting disclosed that the government would spend N807 million for the training.
Abati said the youth are to be trained in information technology and agriculture in continuation of the existing programme with the Ministry of Agriculture at the cost of N258.7 million and N549 million respectively.
The N807 million is in addition to the over $1 billion (N158 billion) the federal government has so far spent on the amnesty programme since 2009. These figures were disclosed by Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Malam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, while delivering a lecture at the first Ochendu Youth Empowerment Series, held recently at the Michael Okpara Auditorium, Umuahia, Abia state.
The Minister of State for Niger Delta, Darius Ishaku, while explaining the government’s latest training contract yesterday, said that the government has decided to go as far as attaching the youth to employers after the training.
These expenditures come at a time when nationwide youth unemployment stands at almost 50%, with unemployment rate rising every year by 16%, and the North east embroiled in a deadly militant insurgency which most analysts ascribed to poverty and unemployment.
In addition to the problem of unemployment, there are the problems of armed robbery in the South-West, and rampant kidnapping in the South-South and the East. The latest training for the non-militant Niger Delta youth, according to Abati, will be staggered across states in the region, including Cross River and other states. The federal government’s existing Amnesty programme has so far been engaged in the training of youths in Ghana, South Africa, the Philippines, Russia, Ukraine, India, among other countries. Also, more than 5,000 youths have been enrolled in formal schools and various vocational training centres within and outside the country. Available data show that no fewer than 5,067 of the total beneficiaries had already graduated in various skills acquisition fields.
Source: People’s Daily