21st September, 2012
The Federal Government and the World Bank have earmarked $180 million for the training of graduates of tertiary institutions in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) as well as job-related skills.
The initiative is being implemented through the Science and Technology Education Post-Basic (Step-B) Project under the Federal Ministry of Education, in partnership with the Ministry of Labour and Productivity, Ministry of Communications Technology and the Outsourcing Development Initiative of Nigeria, a private sector company that trains unemployed graduates with skills and connects them with employers.
National coordinator for Step B at the education ministry, Michael Adikwu, said there were complaints that many Nigerian graduates were not directly employable because they lacked certain skills.
Adikwu said the World Bank came up with the new economic skills programme for Africa where candidates are trained in ICT and tested in various skills such as grammar, teamwork, and organisational and administrative skills.
He explained that the programme was not about getting job interviews but was an opportunity for employers to tell candidates what they were looking for.
As part of the project, 1,007 graduate employees attending the Access Nigeria Job Fair in Lagos on 14 September were matched with prospective employers in various sectors of the economy ranging from aviation, manufacturing, banking, telecommunications, IT, oil and gas, education and engineering.
—Henry Ojelu