2023: I’ll declare my ambition for presidency in April – Ngige

Ngige explained that he needed the next few months for further consultation.

He said, “Easter is around the corner and that’s in April. There will be another event of this sort and there, I will make my stand known on the 2023 presidential race as I promised on December 31, 2021 during our end-of -the-year gathering. Give me these remaining two months to round off consultations.”

The Minister meanwhile advised beneficiaries of the skills training and empowerment programmes  of the Federal Government to desist from  selling machines and other tools  given them to practice skills and create employment.

He explained that the programme would  train and empower 3000 youths  from each of the thirty-six States of the Federation and the FCT.

He urged the beneficiaries  to put the items to good use and justify the efforts of the Ministry which has spent over N50 million  on them.

Ngige cautioned: “The era when beneficiaries leave the venue only to sell these items is gone. Go and use them to practice the skills you have been taught, employ yourselves and others. Where you have an existing business , use them for expansion and lift more people out of poverty. We have a monitoring team and we will involve the security agencies over any case of diversion of the machines.

“Time is also gone when we all queue up for white collar jobs. They are not even available any more. The global trend is now on blue collar jobs, with skills in information and technology which is a very wide area, in others like mechanics and mechatronics, in creativity such as designing and making of wears, building technology as in POP making, screeding, carpentry and wood works and most importantly,  in multiple value chains in agriculture.”