By Okoloma Ikpangi
Concerning the incident which took place 6pm yesterday, Wednesday, 24/10/2018 in Bonny Kingdom; a riot broke out, which was led by an angry mob as they expressed their distaste concerning the rate of unemployment in Bonny.
What people should be aware of is that a lot of on-site employment processes take place within the premises of most companies in our community. This satisfies the interest of company staffs and also alters the employment quota system in our community which is 60% employment for indigenes and 40% employment for non-indigenes. This has been a major contributor in the increase of unemployment in our community.
Another major contributor is lack of skills by most indigenes which makes them incompetent for the job they enroll for. Companies have policies which require them to employ those who are competent to handle a given task which is related to the type of service they want because of safety regulations and time management.
Recently, the BIRC (BONNY INTEGRATED RECRUITMENT CENTRE), began a skills training programme which is free and its purpose is meant to help prepare the people of Bonny for the coming TRAIN 7 PROJECT which is fast approaching because lack of skills will lead to massive failure during job screening, which means the problem of unemployment will still be a cycle that cannot be broken.
The establishment of a skill acquisition programme by the BIRC is a good step, but this should have been implemented decades ago to help instill the culture/tradition of self-reliance or self-development in youths in Bonny Kingdom.
N3billion is been received annually by Bonny Kingdom from the NIGERIA LIQUEFIED NATURAL GAS yearly, which is meant to drive a sustainable community but yet there are no programmes which are meant to help mitigate (reduce) the rate of unemployment in our community, Bonny, because the process is been delayed by legal issues associated with the N3billion. Employment rate can be boosted by diversifying the economy within Bonny e.g. Tourism, Real Estate, Agriculture, etc., to help reduce the rate of unemployment.
In conclusion, such incidents which occurred yesterday (Wednesday, 24/10/2018) will continue to occur and the only solution can be achieved if, and only if, the people of Bonny Kingdom are ready to develop themselves in skills and the authorities in Bonny Kingdom begin to develop its people in all disciplines and find a means to diversify the economy within its community.
OKOLOAMA IKPANGI, a socio-political pressure group in Bonny Local Government Area, contributed this piece.
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