40,000 youths to benefit from Enugu’s digital, entrepreneurial skills empowerment programme

Enugu State government has said that it was targeting 40,000 youths for empowerment in digital and entrepreneurial skills to be done on annual basis.

This move, according to Peter Mbah, the governor of the state, is to enable the youth compete in the global digital and entrepreneurial markets.

The governor gave this hint in his keynote address at the Tech and Entrepreneurship (TxE) Summit in Enugu during which he also disclosed that the state government had commenced the training of young people on digital innovation, programming, digital marketing, financial technology, entrepreneurship, among other requisite technological, financial, and business skills.

Mbah explained at the summit with the theme, ‘Innovation Unleashed: Transforming Enugu’s Future,’ that the strategic role of his government in enabling better and viable future for the youth in the state was to provide an environment full of opportunities for them to thrive.

He stressed that measures were being put in place to ignite the young ones to unleash their creative energy by embracing the emerging future of robotics, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, virtual reality, innovation through skills in information technology.

The governor, who observed that the global order was rapidly moving away from analogue and anachronistic ways of doing things to a modern ways enabled by technology, charged the youths to seize the opportunity the TeX summit had afforded them to attune themselves to new order to remain relevant and economically self-reliant in an increasingly competitive global environment.

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“We are talking about robotics, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, virtual reality, among other emerging skills today. These are perhaps skills that would keep you relevant in today’s world. Ours in Enugu State is to provide you with the right environment, the support and the skills,” he added.

While drawing the synergy between technology and entrepreneurship, the governor enjoined the youths to think creatively and come up with ideas of what to do to add value to the market by repositioning themselves to address some of the societal needs in order to create wealth.

According to him, with the right training and skills, which his government was determined to facilitate by partnering with different tech industries and stakeholders, the youths could create their own greener pasture in Nigeria without having to travel overseas.

“My objective here is to get you to begin to think digitally, to understand that the emerging future is the one that requires you to acquire a digital skill to thrive. And with those digital skills, you do not need to contemplate leaving this country.

I know you might think that the pastures are greener in Europe and the America’s but that is not true. Anybody that told you that has perhaps lied to you. The innovation landscape here is not barren at all,” the governor noted.

“With your innovation here, you are able to create a greener pasture right here on our soil than any other place in the world. See this event as a serious business where you have come to acquire a skill; a skill of a lifetime. A skill that will enable you to conquer the world right here in Enugu State,” the governor said.

Speaking earlier, the founder of TxE Africa, Williams Uche-Mbah, said this year’s event represented the huge potential and promise that Enugu holds for the youths in the fields of technology and entrepreneurship.

He noted that the summit was conceived to ignite innovation, foster collaboration and empower the local entrepreneurial community of youths in the state to unleash a new wave of technological innovation, economic growth and a platform for the global market.

Uche-Mbah further maintained that youths embracing the right tech skills would escape from the scourge of unemployment and poverty, which was the aim of the summit.

“The objective of this summit is to create a platform to groom our youths in the much needed tech and business skills to first decongest the rate of unemployment in Nigeria, and position you for global relevance. Our vision is to reach and empower one million people across Nigeria before the year 2027, and if you wonder how possible this is, look around you,” he stressed.