180,000 Unemployed Apply for Jobs on Edo Portal

Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City
About 180,000 job seekers have applied on the Edo Jobs portal, a platform created by the state government to capture the number of those actually unemployed.

Okwuone Nkechi, of Sabi Hob, a human resource firm in partnership with Accelerated Labs aimed at building a training hub for training young men and women in skills acquisition and job creation, stated this on Thurday in Benin City during a training programme.

 Other members of the partnership include Microsoft and Future Project, two non-governmental organisation.
According to Okwuone, “Edo Jobs is an initiative of the Edo State government and it is designed to create jobs for the unemployed youths in the state.

 She said: ” It is part of the 2017 Edo Jobs Summit. It is a pre-event to the Alaghodaro Summit. The youths have been trained for six months in entrepreneurship. They have now been pitched together to test their skills.

 “In total, we have trained over 600 youths in employability and entrepreneurship.  The training is continuous. We have about 180,000 people on the Edo Jobs portal. We are designing a programme that will reach everyone of them.

 “We are delighted to know that the state government has gathered a data of about 180,000 people. We decided to partner with Edo Jobs so as to train the people. Even though all of them cannot get jobs, they can become job creators.

 Also speaking, the state Commissioner for Women Affairs and Social Development, Margaret Ohenhen, said she was excited about the programme given the economic challenges the nation is passing through.

Mrs. Ohenhen, who was represented by Vitor Okenini, noted that youths present during the training programme have demonstrated creativity and innovation in terms of entrepreneurship.
“It is now very clear that government cannot provide all the jobs for the youths. However, this will hopefully go a long way to creating jobs”, he said.