The National Hydroelectric Power Producing Areas Development Commission (N-HYPPADEC) has called for the enactment of a law that will criminalise the non-wearing of life jackets by boat passengers across the country.
Speaking during a stakeholders’ meeting on the agency’s Youth Transformation Programme (YTP) in Ilorin on Thursday, the managing director of HYPPADEC, Abubakar Yelwa, implored the leadership of Houses of Assembly in its catchment areas to immediately commence processes of enacting the law with a view to reducing death rates from boat mishaps in riverine communities across the country.
Yelwa said that enactment of the law is necessary due to the increasing number of deaths related to boat mishaps in some parts of the country, recalling how a riverine community lost 130 people to a single boat mishap.
Represented by the director of community and rural development of the commission, Dr. Mahmud Muhammed, the HYPPADEC boss said that the agency has trained over 5,000 youths in its YTP scheme.
He said 800 youths who benefited from the scheme in Kwara State will soon get starter packs to commence their own businesses and go ahead to employ others.
He said the starter packs that would be distributed to the beneficiaries, who were trained in 15 vocations, which include tailoring and fish farming, cost N255,620,973.
He enjoined the beneficiaries not to sell the starter packs but to put them to judicious use, adding that “we do this to remove the youths from the streets, thereby ensuring security in society.
“We encourage them to choose their preferred vocations. About 5,000 youths were trained across the member states of HYPPADEC.”.
Earlier, the state coordinator of HYPPADEC, Hajiya Ajarat Al-Hassan, had said that 800 Kwara youths were trained in the agency’s youth transformation programme.
“We have trained 800 youths in every area of skill under the YTP scheme. We paid the beneficiaries some stipends during the course of the training. We shall soon provide them with starter packs,” she said.
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