Dangote Refinery to Empower Youths in Host Communities

• Dangote Refinery to Empower Youths in Host Communities

Dangote Petroleum Refinery & Petrochemicals Company has inaugurated a vocational training scheme that will instill necessary skills in young men and women from the Ibeju-Lekki area of its operation.

The company said the initiative was part of efforts aimed at making youths from its host communities employable.

The Executive Director, Capital Projects, Dangote Group, Mr Devakumar Edwin, described the initiative as a demonstration of Dangote Refinery’s commitment towards capacity building and youth empowerment in the country.

The programme, which was launched in collaboration with the National Directorate of Employment and the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board on Wednesday, was designed to cover plumbing, masonry, welding, iron bending, auto mechanics and electrical works.

Edwin said the scheme was geared towards instant value addition to the lives of the youths and their communities as they would be equipped with trade skills that would prepare them for better opportunities.

At a ceremony, which was attended by traditional rulers and community leaders, including the Oba of Lagos, Rilwan Akiolu, the Dangote Group boss said the company would continue to invest in projects that would add value to the lives of the people in the communities hosting its facilities across the country.

He said, “At Dangote Industries Limited, our Corporate Social Responsibility projects are centred around the development and wellbeing of the people, especially our host communities. In Ibeju Lekki, we have executed several projects that are enhancing the lives of the people. We have provided boreholes for all the communities, blocks of classrooms for the local schools, and we just awarded scholarships to 51 secondary school students.

“This programme is another level of our intervention as it is targetted at providing vocational skills to the teeming youth population in our host communities. The youths are veritable assets in any society and the quality of the youths determines the outlook of tomorrow’s society. Therefore, an investment in developing vocational skills among the youths will yield the desired results.”

The Executive Secretary, NCDMB, Mr Simbi Wabote, commended Dangote Refinery on its achievement, saying the Nigerian content was geared towards promoting domiciliation of value-adding activities and utilisation of Nigerian human and material resources.