The Federal Government has said that it aims at training 35,000 Lagos State residents who registered for its Project T-MAX (TVET Maximisation) initiative on various vocational skills.
The pilot project is part of the Federal Government’s vow to lift 100 million Nigerians out of poverty by 2030.
Lagos is one of the seven states for the pilot scheme of Project T-MAX (TVET Maximisation) Initiative.
Mr. Fela Bank-Olemoh, Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to President Muhammadu Buhari on Education Interventions, revealed this at the screening of applicants in Lagos on Thursday, saying that 35 TVET centres had been certified in the state for the smooth take-off of the free training.
“We have about 35,000 people registered in Lagos state, and nationwide we have, as of now, over 350,000 people registered for T-MAX (TVET Maximisation initiative). We are only taking 15,000.
“So, what we are doing now is the selection process. Based on the criteria such as age and the skills available, we are going to screen the 35,000 applicants down to the 3000 that we are going to take in Lagos.
“As we are screening all across the states right now, we have picked 35 TVET centres that we are going to use to train in Lagos.
“Out of the 35 centres, 33 of them are private sector owned, only two are government-owned,” he said.
Bank-Olemoh said that the vast number of applicants had revealed to the government the need to make the programme bigger in the coming years.
According to him, the Federal Government is excited that Nigerians want to learn and that the government is also able to help Nigerians learn.
On the skills covered by the project, the presidential aide mentioned that all the skills were covered but the data showed that in Lagos and across the country, the foremost skills Nigerians desired were tailoring/fashion design, beauty, and ICT- based skills.
Bank-Olemoh added that the Federal Government had partnered with the private sector to train the applicants to create wealth.
“We are excited that we get into the private sector to help us train these residents. It is a challenge to those that are going to be picked to take it very seriously.
”If out of 35000, the 3000 that are picked need to take the classes seriously and at the end should add value,” he said.
According to him, everybody that takes the programme is going to get certified.
“They are going to get certificates they can use to get jobs also. So that excites us.
“I just hope that everybody takes it very seriously and that we add value to the local economy,” the aide added.
According to him, the centres will be training the selected applicants over the next three months, expressing confidence that these residents will add value to the local economy in their states.
According to him, Project T-MAX is a Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) programme, approved by the National Steering Committee on National Poverty Reduction with Growth Strategy (NPRGS).
The SSA to the president added that the pilot phase of this project would run from Aug. to Dec. in seven states, namely: Lagos, Ogun, Edo, Enugu, Kaduna, Nasarawa and Gombe
Bank-Olemoh stated that the objectives were also to ensure that the TVET centres across the states were operating at full capacity while providing free skills training and pumping resources into the local economy.
Folasade Adefisayo, the Lagos State Commissioner for Education, expressed excitement about the free training and said there were many jobs that people did not have skills for.
Adefisayo said that the project would provide an avenue to create more productive citizens in the future.
The commissioner advised residents to look out for more opportunities to be productively engaged and contribute their quotas to nation-building.
“The pilot is just a beginning, and if it works, and we do it well, I am sure that it will be bigger and more people will be able to take part.”
