Taraba, Adamawa Youths Receive Entrepreneurial Skills Training from BOI

The Bank of Industry (BOI) and the African Community Bridge Foundation (ACBF) on Tuesday commenced the training of 131 youths from Taraba and Adamawa in various entrepreneurial skills for job creation and self reliance.Alhaji Dahiru Bala, the branch manager of BOI in charge of Taraba, Adamawa and Gombe, declared the one-week training open in Jalingo, capital of Taraba.Bala said to the trainees, “This training is the Federal Government’s deliberate policy to equip them with adequate entrepreneurial skills and provide you with loans to run profitable businesses in order to boost the economy.“The training, under the government’s Youth Empowerment Scheme Programme (YES-P), is structured in such a way that you cannot just be self reliant but will also create jobs for other youths in the process.”Bala explained that what the trainees were going to get from the bank after the training was not a grant but a loan which they would pay back within three years of doing business.The manager commended Gov. Darius Ishaku of Taraba for hosting the training, saying the gesture would go a long way in ensuring the success of the exercise.In his remarks, Dr Lucky Onmonya, the Programme Director of African Community Bridge Foundation, advised the trainees to take the exercise seriously.He said that through it they would gain life transforming skills that would guarantee their future.Onmonya said that the ACBF had assembled very competent hands to take the trainees in various trades, noting that the training was more valuable than the loan itself.“I want to urge you all to focus more on the training than on the loan so as to avail yourselves of the required knowledge to manage the loan to your advantage,” he said.Mr Abba Akawo, the Taraba State Commissioner for Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation, commended the Federal Government for taking practical steps toward tackling unemployment in the country.Akawo, represented by Mr Emeka Ukaegbu, a deputy director in the ministry, urged the trainees to take advantage of the opportunity to get the nation out of its current economic recession.Responding on behalf of the trainees, Miss Hauwa Biyansina commended President Muhammadu Buhari for moving to empower the youth to greatness.