The management of the Micheal Imoudu National Institute for Labour Studies (MINILS), Ilorin has lauded the intervention of President Muhammadu Buhari in the area of employment generation initiatives through agriculture.
The institute said the initiative has given birth to sharp reduction in the nation’s major food import bill from $2.23billion in 2014 to $0.59billion at the end of 2018.
It added also that the rice import bill alone dropped from $1 billion to $18.5 million annually with some of the federal government’s programmes.
This was contained a statement issued in Ilorin to commemorate June 12 democracy day celebration and signed by the institute’s Deputy Director, Special Duties, Ezeikel . O. Ojo, on behalf of the Director General, Comrade Issa Aremu.
The institute said it aligned with the statement credited to President Buhari that the twin weproblems aggravating insecurity in the country remain poverty and youth unemployment.
It expressed the commitment of the agency to collaborate with the government at the centre and state levels to curb the issue of unemployment.
“MINILS agrees with President Buhari in his Democracy speech that “the twin underlying drivers of insecurity include poverty and youth unemployment.” We also commend various unprecedented employment generation initiatives of President Buhari that include Interventions led by the government and the Central Bank of Nigeria targeted mostly to the agricultural, services, infrastructure, power and health care sectors of the economy, Anchor Borrowers Programme resulted in sharp decline in the nation’s major food import bill from $2.23billion in 2014 to US$0.59billion by the end of 2018. Rice import bill alone dropped from $1 billion to $18.5 million annually.
“The National Labour Institute Ilorin through its Enterprise Development programme would offer various capacity skills development for workers in formal and informal sectors to promote employability of the youth”, the statement said.
It also commended Buhari for deepening democratic governance with his acknowledgememt and recognition of June 12, 1993 annulled election, which the late business mogul, Moshood Abiola, was said to have won.
The statement added, “Today, Nigerians celebrate and hail the statesmanship of President Muhammadu Buhari in correcting the injustice of annulment of 1993 globally adjudged free and fair elections. President Buhari’s decision made the point that never again would Nigerians allow violation of peoples’ mandate through annulment and non-democratic usurpation of power”.
