Lagos State government has inaugurated the Transition Committee for the National Youth Council of Nigeria, Lagos State Chapter.
The Commissioner for Youths and Social Development, Mr Segun Dawodu, who inaugurated the committee at Alausa, Ikeja, urged its leadership to act in the interest of the youths in the state, adding that they should ensure peace reigned among the various stakeholders and youth organisations in the state.
He commended the Council for its resolve to put an end to the lingering crisis within its ranks in the last three years.
“Your choice of using dialogue as opposed to resorting to violence to resolve your differences for the common good, growth and development of the Council and its members, is a great gesture.”
He said the effort is proof that youths are ready to take on the mantle of leadership. He assured them that the Ministry would continue to play its supervisory roles to support, encourage and collaborate with the state chapter of the Council.
He added that the state government will give all the support it could give to the youths, urging them to embrace technology, a sector that can help combat unemployment in the state and beyond.
“Information technology is the way to go globally; the sector encourages entrepreneurship and could generate a lot of employment for youths.
Youths must be technologically inclined although much work still needs to be done in the area of development for the youths.
“Many youths seem to have lost hope, they feel they have no future and that leaders have given up on them. Let me assure you that we leaders in Lagos state will not give up on the youths, we will support and be with them.
Many youths feel they have been rejected, a lot have no jobs and I would love that we (Lagos State government) employ all the youths but it is not possible. As a youth, I made a mistake and I learnt from them, youths must be given a chance, but we all have to work together and put hope in our youths.
“What we can do as a government is to assist them and this is why we have several programmes to assist the youths and we will come up with more.
Among the programmes we have is to talk to the youths, guide and mentor them. We have programmes in place whereby people who have gone through what they are going through and have come out of it will talk to them. We have various youth centres in the state and we plan to develop and equip them with educational technologies and recreational activities.
“We will also come up with programmes to address drugs among the youths, because it is endemic and not limited to being poor, rich or in the average class.