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Benjamin Babine, Abuja
The FCT minister, Muhammad Musa Bello, has assured the management of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) of his administration’s support for all its activities in the FCT.
Speaking while declaring open the grand finale of the NYSC Sports and Cultural Festival held at the Abuja National Stadium on Tuesday, the minister expressed support for the NYSC festival by stating it’s important to national unity.
“May I also use this opportunity to thank the management of the scheme for the choice of Abuja as the host of this important youth fiesta. The FCT administration continues to pledge our support of the NYSC and all the activities that you will do in the Federal Capital Territory.
“The NYSC and Abuja as a city all share a very laudable attribute of being edifices and institutions that clearly show our unity as a nation and that’s why at any occasion we have, it is very important for us to salute the founding fathers of the NYSC particularly elder statesman Gen. Yakubu Gowon.
“In spite of what you hear, Nigeria is a great nation with tremendous potentials. May the God Almighty continue to make the NYSC a symbol and strength of our unity as a nation,” he prayed.
Musa Bello commended the NYSC DG for providing platform to promote the talents and skills of corps members.
“I want to use this opportunity to commend the DG and the entire NYSC management for providing this platform for showcasing and developing the talents of our youths and I congratulate the states that have made it to this final stage of the festival having scaled the huddles of preliminary contest at the zonal level.”
Speaking earlier, the Director-General NYSC, Brigadier General Shuaibu Ibrahim, pleaded with sports administrators and other leaders in private and public sectors to give corps members career opportunities at national teams and their industries.
He said: “I wish to use this opportunity to appeal to the football and other sport federations, club owners as well as the drivers of the entertainment industries to give interested and talented corps members the opportunity to pursue careers in their fields of endeavour.”
Brig-Gen Ibrahim added that the NYSC is providing a platform for developing the talents of corps members through various initiatives. Speaking on some of them, he said: “In line with the saying ‘charity begins at home,’ we have given opportunity to serving corps members and others that completed the national service recently to participate in an NYSC movie titled ‘A Call to Service,’ which is currently under production. Apart from it’s entertainment function, the movie is being packaged as a tool for public sensitization on the roles of stakeholders in the scheme, including the various tiers of government, corps employers as well as serving and prospective corps members, as spelt out in the NYSC Act.”
He thanked organizations in public and private sector who have helped in contributing towards the success of the festival.
“I wish to express our profound gratitude to the various organizations in the public and private sector, who have contributed towards the successful organization of this festival through sponsorship and technical support. However, I am constrained to add that the level of private sector involvement in the sponsorship still falls below our expectations.”
Out of the 36 states and the FCT that began the competition on the zonal stage, only 18 states and the FCT made it to the finals. The 18 states apart from the FCT that are participating in the ceremony this year are Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Benue, Cross River, Delta, Edo, Enugu, Jigawa, Kano, Kogi, Niger, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Plateau and Sokoto states.
