Peter Obi, the Vice Presidential Candidate of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), on Thursday lauded the job creation initiative of Delta State Gov. Ifeanyi Okowa.
Obi gave the commendation after a tour of a job Creating exhibition in Asaba mounted by beneficiaries of Okowa’s youths empowerment and entrepreneurial programmes drawn from across the state.
He said that the job creation initiative could only be compared with that of Tony Elumelu Foundation, adding that the focus of every government should be on how to create employment.
According to him, Elumelu is from Delta, so, other governments should come to Delta and learn how to grow business enterprises.
“The focus of every government is to create employment and you can’t solve unemployment anywhere in the world without promoting micro and small enterprises”.
“So, what governor Okowa is doing through the job creation office is training people and giving them the funding to start their own business. I don’t want to compare them with those who give people N10,000 without training”.
“Who do we even know that they are giving the money, how will they collect the money? But here Okowa trains and support them with funding to establish their businesses.”
Earlier, Okowa had said that the economic downturn on his assumption of office had threatened to abort and derail his campaign promise of prosperity for all Deltans, but he remained resolute.
“However, we refused to be deterred, but convinced and confident that our novel job creation scheme, geared at nurturing, supporting and promoting micro, small and medium scale enterprises would trigger off economic growth, social inclusion and sustainable development”.
“We commenced implementation of our enterprise development Programme in form of the Skills Training and Entrepreneurship Programme (STEP) and Youth Agricultural Entrepreneurs Programme (YAGEP)”.
“Through the job creation scheme, 4,253 unemployed youths have become business owners across the various skills such as information, communication technology, catering, event management, beauty services, agricultural production and processing, food packaging, tilling, plumbing, and electrical installation,” he said.
The governor said some entrepreneurs raised by the programme had become employers of labour which multiplier effects on the family and that of the state remained significant. (NAN)
