Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu has challenged the State Employment Trust Fund, LSETF, to do more in empowering Lagosians, especially the unemployed.
The Governor threw the challenge in Victoria Island at the opening of a two day Employment summit jointly convened by the LSETF, and the Ministry of Economic Planning and Budget, themed; “Sustainable Job Creation Strategies: Collective Action and Prosperity for All”
Governor Sanwo-Olu who expressed confidence that the Fund has the capacity to surpass it’s current achievements promised to double the budget of the LSETF.
He said: “We have seen that LSETF can work and indeed, it is working. We have seen the potential of the agency in sustaining creation of job opportunities for our teeming productive residents. I strongly believe that we can achieve a lot more in bringing down the unemployment rate in Lagos if we entrust the agency with a lot more capital grants to support businesses and innovative people.
“LSETF has the capacity and has demonstrated it in the last four years. Given the opportunity of increased funding, the agency can double the employment figures. It is only by scaling up the subvention that we can further demonstrate our readiness to reduce the rate of unemployment. I have asked for the agency’s budget size and I have seen what it is. This is a public pronouncement that we are doubling the subvention” he said
In an address of welcome, the Board Chairperson, Mrs Bola Adesola noted that the achievements of the Fund in the last five years had made it a model in Nigeria.
Mrs Adesola announced that in addition to it’s ongoing rendering of support and issuance of grants, the Fund would be unveiling an innovation challenge for Lagosians to pitch creative and innovative ideas and urged residents to take advantage of all the opportunities provided on the LSETF platforms.
In his remarks, the Co convener and Commissioner for Economic Planning and Budget, Mr Sam Egube, who said statistics shows that the unemployment rate in Lagos is 37.3 and youth unemployment at 42.5% noted that resolving the unemployment challenge is collective responsibility and the summit
is one of the solutions being provided by government.
While sharing the Fund’s journey in the last five years and the successes and the many lessons learnt, so far, the LSETF Executive Secretary, Mrs Teju Abisoye said it had created and supported over three hundred thousand jobs, assisted over thirty thousand MSMEs with grants and supported four hundred start-ups among others.
