NIGERIA. Niger State: Through the Federal Government’s At-Risk Children Project (ARC-P), the Niger state government empowered 72,000 youths and met the needs of out-of-school children in the state.
Dr. Amina Abubakar Bello, the wife of the Niger State Governor and the program’s leader, made the announcement while greeting the ARC-P team to the state capital.
Bello further added that the program will help to create more jobs for the nation’s youths as well as provide an avenue for out-of-school children to receive the necessary education.
She also stated that the state administration will do everything possible to make the most of the opportunity provided by the federal government.
“Long before today, the state government was recognised for its unwavering dedication to the development of its youngsters and for providing opportunities for out-of-school children to excel and become more useful among their peers,” Bello added.
However, Bello informed the people of the state and the federal government of the state governments that the programme would be sustained and that modalities for state-of-the-art facilities would be in place to help the programme function more smoothly.
Hajiya Maryam Uwais, Special Advisor to President Mohammadu Buhari on Social Investment Programme, clarified the situation by adding that the programme is a Federal Government initiative to provide acceptable solutions to the country’s out-of-school-children problem.
“The core aim of this initiative is to help in fishing out issues related to out-of-school-children, youths unemployment and to assess them to a profound lasting solution, depending on the existing effort put in place by the state government to add value to people’s lives and reduce poverty and joblessness,” Uwais noted.
The programmes
The workshops, according to Uwais, would tackle seven different aspects of literacy and numeracy, including digital skills, financial skills, gatekeeper skills, and climate challenges.
Other skills include; vocational skills, life & sports skills, and agricultural skills.
“The project is to support children and youths without education to go to school and empower them with skills to achieve their full potential”.
“The team however visited Islamic schools where out-of-school-children are temporarily residing,” Uwais said.
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