The Director-General, Brigadier General Sulaiman Kazaure, has expressed happiness over Corps members’ enthusiasm for the Skills Acquisition and Entrepreneurship Development (SAED) programme.

He made the remark at the closing ceremony of the in-camp component of the SAED training for the 2016 Batch ‘B’ (Stream II) Corps members at the NYSC FCT Permanent Orientation Camp, Kubwa.

Kazaure stressed that white-collar jobs were difficult to get, and advised the Corps members to continue to avail themselves of the opportunity provided by the SAED programme to empower themselves with necessary skills, create jobs and generate wealth to rebuild the Nigerian economy.

The Director-General, who went round to inspect various products made by the Corps members, praised their commitment to acquiring skills while also thanking all the trainers and collaborating agencies for their support.

“I have no doubt that all of you have laid a solid foundation of interest in skill acquisition upon which we now expect you to develop your post-camp training and eventual financial empowerment.

“The NYSC Management will stand by you at all times to secure the necessary funds to establish your businesses, especially through our collaboration with the Central Bank of Nigeria, Heritage Bank and the Bank of Industry,” he said.

Earlier in his welcome address, the NYSC FCT Coordinator, Mr. AbdulRazak Salawu had said that the empowerment of Corps members and other youths with skills for self-employment was necessary in order to enable them contribute to national development.

He said such empowerment would also curb the rate of the youths’ migration to Europe in search of greener pasture.

Salawu praised Kazaure for his commitment to enhancing the gains of the SAED programme through provision of training manual and other forms of support.

He appealed for stakeholders’ assistance in the provision of more training materials that would be fairly sufficient for the number of participating Corps members in each skill area.

There were goodwill messages from the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, National Information Technology Development Agency and the Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria.