The Federal Ministry of Budget and National Planning has given details of the N-Power Knowledge Multi Track Youth Empowerment Programme which it says will engage 50,000 non-graduate Nigerians between the ages of 18-35 years.

A document on the scheme made available to News Express said the programme is under the auspices of the National Social Investment Programme (NSIP) and the amount involved is N5,595,868,250.00, inclusive of 5% tax and completion period is 12 months, with Messrs Softcom Limited as consultant.

On the nature of programme, the ministry said that the N-Power Knowledge “is a non-graduate programme that will engage 50,000 non-graduate Nigerians between the ages of 18-35 years to be trained and developed as young creative talents, equipped and supported to meet the local and international demand for software developers, web designers, animators, graphic artists and maintenance/assembling of mobile phones, tablets, computers and other devices. It aims at training, investing in work/business tools and facilitating transition to market.”

The general objective “is to foster innovation and transfer to young Nigeria beneficiaries, technical proficiency in the manufacturing, assembly, repair and maintenance of devices ranging from computers to smart phones tablets, POS machines and other electronic devices that are fairly common in everyday enterprises within Nigeria.”

On the target, the document said: “The training intends to transform the 12,000 beneficiaries from unemployed/underemployed trainees to employed citizens and entrepreneurs, from licensed mobile money agents to agents of nationwide sales, services and repair centres and distributorship network. The 12,000 will in turn each train additional 5 youths, bringing the total beneficiaries to 60,000.”

As regards qualification, “the programme is open to all unemployed Nigerian youths irrespective of socio-economic or educational background and it has a global target to engage and train 12,000 across the six geo-political zones of the country.”