Focus on education, youth employment, group task Bauchi gov

Samuel Luka – Bauchi

Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi state has been advised to give priority to youth employment and education for the socio-economic development of the state.

A group known as Forum of Executive Directors of Civil Society Organizations which gave the advice at a press conference lamented that 80 per cent of youth in the state are either uneducated or unemployed.

The advice, according to the forum is part of its recommendations to the governor to implement in his first 100 days in office.

Chairman of the forum, Sodangi Chindo said a survey carried out by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and UNICEF indicates that Bauchi state has the highest number of out- of- school children in the country.

He said that the survey showed that 1.3 million children are still not enrolled in school, hence the need to declare a state of emergency in the education sector.

Other recommendations proffered by the civil society organizations for the new administration, include developing a robust long term development plan that will guide it in tackling the myriads of challenges it inherited.

“There is the need to adopt unity, diversity and professionalism in the governor’s cabinet in order to reflect the defiance exhibited by the good people of Bauchi state who elected him from across ethnic, gender, religious and party lines

“The governor should appoint a professional who knows our communities and the development challenges faced across the different communities as his adviser on non-governmental organization matters.

This is to ease our channel of communication and feedback and it will also fast track quality data collection for a bottom up approach in solving our communities challenges,” Chindo said.