The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) has introduced different skills acquisition programmes to prepare corps members for life after the scheme.
The State Coordinator of the NYSC in Ondo State, Mr James Olugbodi, said this while flagging off the Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) on Monday at the NYSC orientation camp, Ikare-Akoko.
Olugbodi at the programme said he was happy with the vision of the Director-General of the scheme, Brig.-Gen. Suleiman Kazaure, for planning life after “Allawee” for corps members.
He said different programmes like bead making, cosmetology, agro-allied businesses, event management, shoe making, and so on, would be thought over by different facilitators who were also former corps members as well.
Olugbodi pleaded that the programme should be keyed into by the corps members because white collar jobs were hard to get nowadays.
“The NYSC thought the best way is to teach corps members skills on how they will be able to stand alone, when the monthly allowance stops after service.
“This will help to solve the problem of unemployment, to some extent, in the country.
“The one we are doing in camp is like an introduction, after they are posted out of the camp, they will be given a list of our facilitators in the various local governments to continue the training,” he said.
Olugbodi charged corps members to be encouraged and to key into the skills acquisition programme.
Mrs Ehimwenma Itohan, an Assistant Director, SAED in the state, said the programme was one of the major ones to be run in the orientation camp.
Itohan said the programme was divided into two phases, the camp training and the post-camp training.
She also said that the training was not optional, as most of the corps members didn’t know what will happen after the scheme, saying, “they can easily embark on skills acquired’’.
“It comprises of learning soft skills and the proper training itself through facilitators. It is not optional, it’s part of camp activities which they must embrace,” she said.
Also speaking at the event, Mrs Jennifer Dawodu, Head of SAED at the camp, said corps members must always think of what they could give back to the society and not the other way round.
Dawodu said banks would be approaching the corps members to give soft loans to help them to invest in any of the acquired skills and to start businesses of their own.
She said the loans ranged from N10, 000 to N100, 000.
“We want our corps members to be self-reliant. Your parents have tried to take care of you up to this stage, so they should not be a disappointment by going back home after service and be collecting money from them,” she added. (NAN)|