Recruitment Into Federal Civil Service No Solution To Unemployment- Keyamo

 

Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Mr Festus Keyamo has posited that the government employing staff into the federal civil service cannot solve the issue of unemployment. 

According to him, the government of President Muhammadu Buhari targets more high-yielding approaches to tackle the prevailing alarming unemployment rate than just enrol Nigerians into the civil service.

He said: “I think your question assumes that the kind of employment want to create is in civil service. That’s not the idea of employment. All around the world employment, public services employment account for less than one per cent of employment.

“So, it will be very short sighted of us as government, very myopic, very, like wrong game approach to think that we want to lift people out of poverty and create employment by opening up gaps in the civil service to employ people.

“How many are we going to employ for the 33% (unemployment rate) that we have now is so high.

“The unemployment figures are indefensible. The 33% was compounded more by the COVID scourge, the whole world is reeling from the COVID scourge. So, we need to react more innovatively to create employment.

“For us, we are working very hard to ensure that we skill up Nigerians. The way to approach on employment is to skill up the populace. That’s the way out, to encourage the small, the macro small and medium scale entrepreneurs, support their businesses, ensure that people are self-employed, skill them up.