The Director-General of the National Directorate of Employment, NDE, Mallam Abubakar Fikpo, has been honoured with Award of Excellence by the National Youth Progressive Council, NYPC, an umbrella body of Nigerian youths in vanguard of equity, unity peace, justice and qualitative service.
The deputy director, Information and Public Relations, NDE, Mr. Israel Adekitan, made this known in a statement he issued.
He said the president of the council, Ibrahim Selim, declared that the award was in recognition of the DG’s assiduous efforts at job creations towards combating mass unemployment in Nigeria.
The council, he said, noted that NDE in the last three years had made giant strides in the areas of blue collar jobs creation, women empowerment, poverty alleviation and wealth creation.
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According to Adekitan, while expressing appreciation, the NDE boss spoke about the establishment of the directorate and its mandate which he said was to create jobs for teeming unemployed Nigerians.
He said the faithful implementations of the directorate’s four core programmes namely Vocational Skill Development, VSD; Small Scale Enterprises, SSE; Special Public Works, SPW, and Rural Employment Promotion, REP, had, to a reasonable extent, reduced the level of despair and disillusionment associated with unemployment in Nigeria.
His words: “NDE is an agency of the federal government established in 1986 and specifically mandated to design and implement programmes potent enough to fight unemployment and create jobs. For over three decades, NDE trends on vocational skills acquisition, entrepreneurship development, agricultural promotion and public works for self-reliance and self-employment.
“The realities and evidences of breakthroughs emanating from self-employment initiatives have reinforced our belief in the efficacy of skills acquisition training, which globally, has demystified the seemingly intractable challenges of unemployment and poverty.”
The Director-General then called on all unskilled and all unemployed persons in Nigeria to embrace the opportunities for self-reliance as presented in all the states of the federation by the NDE.
He added: “NDE is willing to empower as many as possible under the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu GCFR. The Directorate has programmes and schemes good enough to liberate all willing Nigerians from joblessness and poverty. We are also expanding our dragnet to accommodate unemployed youths with passion for agriculture.
“We are committed to the provision of innovative ideas and employment creation models that will continue to complement micro economic policies of the federal government led by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR.”
Just a fortnight ago, the Coalition of Civil Society Network, CCSN, led by its National Coordinator, Zakari Hashim, visited the headquarters of the NDE and presented the DG with Outstanding Award for diligence Service.
The award was in recognition of the DG’s immense contribution towards societal transformation and community development for sustainable growth.
Another organization, the Arewa Youth Advocacy for Good Governance, had earlier in the year recognised the Director-General as the Icon of National Development.
There are awards from other numerous organisations such as the United Nations Global Solidarity Movement for Gender Equality, UNGSMGE, Deradicalization, Rehabilitation, and Reintegration, DRR; National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons, NAPTIP, and many more.
The regular and constant decimal of the recognitions, Adekitan said, was that the honoree’s achievements were based on his dint of hard within the job creation mandate of the NDE.
