Non Repayment Of Loans Worries Bayelsa NDE

The National Directorate of Employment (NDE) in Bayelsa has expressed worry over the non repayment of resettlement loans given to graduated trainees of the National Open Apprenticeship Scheme (NOAS).

The state Coordinator of the Directorate, Mr Sebenimo Egberipou, who disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Yenagoa, said that the situation was not encouraging.

Egberipou said that several persons from the state had benefited from the programme, adding that it was only through the repayment of such loans that others could benefit.

He said that the vocational skills acquisition training programme of the NDE was put in place to train unemployed persons, especially youths and women in various vocational skills.

According to him, the NOAS resettlement scheme is designed to assist selected graduated trainees with equipment to establish workshops in their chosen trades.

“This is also to prevent them from relapsing into the labour market after graduating from training,’’ the coordinator said.

He also appealed to the state and local governments, wealthy individuals, multinational companies and the NGOs to partner with NDE to assist the graduates of the scheme.

NAN reports that the youths were trained in various fields, including wielding, auto-electronic, refrigeration maintenance, hair dressing, shoe making, sewing, leather works, among others.