By ESENVOSA IZAH

Work Nigeria, a human resource consultant company, says it plans to reduce the unemployment trend in the country by putting one million Nigerians back into employment in the coming year.

The company’s Managing Director (MD), Mr Olufemi Oyebanjo, made the disclosure in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday, in Lagos.

Oyebanjo, who expressed dismay over the high unemployment rate, especially among youths in the country, said the company saw an opportunity to contribute to reducing it, thereby improving the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

“We have an ambitious goal to put one million Nigerians back to work; we all know that unemployment is a problem in Nigeria.

“Unfortunately, the age bracket of people that have this problem are the youth: it is our goal to reverse this trend; I remember sometime in 2021, Nigeria was the capital of the highest unemployment rate in the world.

“These are the figures we are here to reverse and help people get jobs; place people in the right jobs, train them on the job; train them for the job, and reduce the ‘Japa syndrome’’’, he said.

The MD said that one of the company’s strategies to address unemployment was to operate ‘Catch Them Young’ from the universities, and would engage the federal, state and private universities to see how it could develop or train the students to be job-ready.

According to him, part of the plans includes to inaugurate its first of its kind Job Board in West Africa in January 2024, where the employers across the world will be meeting with the job seekers, and job opportunities meeting with the right skills.

He said that the company would also organise virtual job fairs in the universities.

“One thing is that we are going to be organising a regular Job Fair, the Virtual Job Fair.

“We understand the fact that there are specifically final-year students, who in their final year get very busy doing projects, classwork and other activities.

So, we are going to organise a virtual job fair that will bring employers all over the world into that event; the students will have the opportunity to speak with employers, and human resources managers of these great companies all over the world.

“Also, the students will be able to prepare themselves, even along the line, by the time they finish, and then at least at that time, they will know what these companies want and what these employers are looking for.

“They will prepare themselves along the line to make sure they are ready by the time they are out of NYSC,” Oyebanjo said. (NAN)

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