The Abia State Government says skills acquisition and entrepreneurship training in the state has been given a big boost with the establishment of a Multi-Disciplinary Skills and Entrepreneurship Development Centre in Umuobiakwa, Obingwa Local Government Area of the state.

The facility has a production centre and an academy that would produce goods and train Nigerians to be entrepreneurs.

Senior Special Assistant to the Abia State Governor on Trade and Investment, Jude Udeachara, who paid an inspection visit to the centre, said government would partner with the centre to groom Abia youths on skills and entrepreneurship.

Udeachara said the centre would enhance the local production campaign of Governor Okezie Ikpeazu administration, stressing that the campaign was already contributing immensely to economic growth of the state and the nation at large.

He commended the bold initiative of Chief Raymond Aliga in establishing the facility, and also praised the Federal Government for choosing the centre for training of N-Power volunteers.

It would be recalled that Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Chris Ngige, while in Abia State during the Town Hall meeting organised by the federal Ministry of Information, paid an unscheduled inspection to the facility and said he was very impressed by what was on ground.

“I have seen the facility and I want to assure you people that I am impressed with this centre. I can tell you that this is well made and it is in consonance with what we need. So, this centre, you can take it for granted that we, as Federal Government, will use this place as N-Power training centre,” the Minister had said

Proprietor of the multi-billion naira Centre, Chief Raymond Aliga, said he decided to set up the centre because he discovered that the problem with skills acquisition in Nigeria was the lack of a common facility centre where entrepreneurs could use for production after procuring orders from clients.

The centre which operates with modern, motorized equipment currently has Furniture and Joinery, Metal Fabrication and Gambion Production (for erosion control), Building and Construction, Shoemaking and Garments Production and Aluminium departments, with room for expansion.

The training arm, Kiara De-Luke Academy, a degree awarding institution, is under the regulation of the National Board for Technical Education and the Ministry of Labour and Employment.

Aliga said the campaign for increased local production of goods and services would blossom with such a common centre, adding that all he was asking from the federal and state governments was patronage.

“What we are asking the Federal Government for, is not to give us money. We are asking the government to patronise us and buy our products and give us young Nigerians to train. If there are areas where the Federal Government is building estates, they should ask to build doors, ask us to build office furniture, the UBEC should ask us to produce school chairs.

“We will train young Nigerians and ask them to come here and produce things they will supply to the Federal Government, by then the policy of the government would have been realised because we realised that President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration wants to build entrepreneurs, not buying Keke NAPEP and generators and giving to people in the name of empowerment,” Aliga added.

He said the visit of the Minister has given him hope that the present administration “is ready to help local people, entrepreneurs in Nigeria and those that are interested in developing youths in Nigeria.”

•Photo shows, from left; CEO, Kiara De-Luke Academy, Endi Ezeagwu, Labour Minister, Chris Ngige, Abia State Commissioner for Health, Dr John Ahukanna.

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