By Goodluck Ikiebe.
President Muhammadu Buhari has declared the first National Youth Conference organized by the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development, in collaboration with private sector partners, open, to commemorate Nigeria’s National Youth Day.
The President assured participants at the opening that the outcome of the conference would be processed and implemented by government.
Buhari, who was represented at the occasion by the Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, stated that the theme for this year’s Conference, which is Youth “Inclusiveness, Governance, Security and Employment” speaks directly to the imperative of the present moments in Nigeria’s history.
According to him, the youth who form the vast majority of the Nigerian population, are in the frontline of every consequential struggle for the future of the country.
This, he added was particularly in the area of ensuring good governance, security, socio-economic growth and development, gender equality, employability, rights of women, as well as concerns and interest of the vulnerable in our society.
The president stated that his administration had designed and delivered innovative means of empowering Nigerian youths, adding that his administration would not relent in creating more enabling environment for the youth to succeed.
The President said that because of the labour of the youth,in addition to being home to the third largest film industry in the world, “we are the epic centre of the global and Pan-African popular culture, anchored to the dynamism of the Nigerian creativity
“This is particularly in the fields of literature, music, sports as well as science and technology, to mention but a few”.stating further that these achievements had led to the winning of several awards.
He, therefore, called on the youth, both at home and in the diaspora, to remain focus in the pursuit of their dreams at all times for the betterment of the country.
Speaking earlier, the Minister of Youth and Sports Development, Mr Sunday Dare, said that November 1 was a day set aside by African Union and dedicated by the Federal Government to celebrate Nigerian Youth.
He said:”The significance of November 1 for the average youth and the activities around this day accentuates our minds and commitment to do something and do more for our youths.
“It is also a good opportunity to deepen youth engagements, conversations and collaborations, but beyond all of this, to begin to act timeously in addressing the needs of our youths”, Dare said.
He added that the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development’s programmes were focused on providing opportunities for the youth in such areas as training, digital skills, entrepreneurship, soft skills, internships and access to credit and finance, among others.
The DEEL programme, according to the Minister, has helped to fill the knowledge and skills gap in the Nigerian youth.
“Our DEEL initiative focuses on Digital literacy and Skills Acquisition, Enterpreneurship, Employability and Leadership. We focus more on training and enterprise. We have trained close to 198,000 youths in the past two years”.
“In addition, “the Nigeria Investment Fund (NYIF) Scheme provides access to funds, much needed by MSMEs and thousands of our youths are benefiting.
” So far, over 6,000 youths from across the country have benefited and we have solid data to back this up. Another 10,000 youths have been short listed for training before benefiting, the process goes on”, he added.
In his remarks, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry, Alhaji Isma’il Abubakar, stated that the National Youth Conference was one of the Ministry’s initiative, targeted at harnessing the thoughts and aspirations of Nigerian youths, with a view to aggregating them as a means of assessing the current youth situation in the country and forge workable strategies to address them.
He assured that the Ministry would continue to provide conducive environment towards the full implementation of the various youth initiatives and programmes, in line with the policy thrust of the present administration.
