Blakskill, Sightsavers Partners on Career Fair for Talents with Disabilities

Sunday Ehigiator

Blakskill Limited, in partnership with Sightsavers, recently hosted a ‘first of its kind’, career fair for talents with disabilities, providing a platform for persons with disabilities to connect with potential employers and explore job opportunities.

The career fair, held in Lagos, brought together leading employers, hiring professionals, HR managers, and ecosystem partners to promote disability inclusion in the workplace.

The event featured a diverse range of activities, including a panel conversation on ‘Inclusion at Work: Creating Opportunities for Talents with Disabilities’, which explored practical strategies for building inclusive workplaces and promoting diversity.

Over 20 companies participated in the fair, with several holding on-the-spot conversations with job seekers and expressing intent to pursue inclusive recruitment initiatives.

Speaking with Journalists, the CEO, Blakskill Ltd, Michael Alasa, noted that the career fair was part of Blakskill’s and Sightsavers’ efforts to promote disability inclusion and empower persons with disabilities to reach their full potential.

According to him, “For decades, talented persons with disabilities (PWDs) have been systematically shut out of the workforce not because they lack skill, intelligence, or ambition, but because of policies that were designed without them in mind.

“Only 3 per cent of persons with disabilities in Nigeria are formally employed. According to the World Bank, our economy loses over N10 trillion annually due to the exclusion of persons with disabilities from the workforce.”

Also speaking, the Programme Officer for Economic Empowerment at Sightsavers, Mr Gambo Yohanna, noted that there is a growing pool of skilled People with Disabilities (PwDs) in the country but lamented that, “employers’ reluctance, driven by stereotypes, remains a key barrier to inclusive hiring.”