By Johnbosco Agbakwuru

ABUJA — THE Federal Government has said it will soon embark on a public sensitization programme aimed at discouraging illegal migration among youths and encouraging them to explore legal labour migration opportunities instead.

Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr. Muhammadu Maigari Dingyadi, stated this in his remarks when he received a delegation from the Giessen-Friedberg

Chambers of Commerce from Germany, who is in Nigeria to promote legal Labor migration.

The Minister said: “We are trying to put in place an efficient publicity to discourage people from going into that and to show them why we should not go into illegal migration because facilities are being provided for legalizing this migration and if we do it both of us stand to benefit from this exercise.”

He expressed delight that he is meeting the delegation for the second time within a short period to further deepen engagement around legal labour migration and Dual Vocational Training.

The Minister commended the Giessen-Friedberg Chambers of Commerce for initiating the pilot phase of the Dual Vocational Training programme involving 18 young Nigerian, who will be deployed to Germany.

Dingyadi noted that Nigeria has a large youth population eager to acquire skills and engage in gainful employment.

“Please I encourage you to do more in this area because we have so many young men and women out there looking for skills so that we can reduce the level of unemployment in our country,” he said.

In his remarks, the leader of the delegation and CEO of the Chambers, Dr. Matthias Leder, said they were in the minister’s office to formally invite him to the unveiling of the 18 Nigerians so far selected to commence dual vocational training in Germany.

“We have already started this prototype. Out of 300 young Nigerians we invited them to participate in two-stage competition and we selected 18, who are now learning German. The good new is that they have passed the most difficult stage – the A1 level of German and we are going to celebrate them on November 12 in Lagos. We we here to formally invite you to the occasion,” he said.

Dr. Leder said the Chamber is committed to discouraging illegal migration through dangerous routes, which is putting the lives of young Nigerians at risk.

Instead, he said, those wishing to migrate to Germany can invest in learning the German language to prepare them for dual vocational training in that country.

Other members of the delegation from the IHK Giessen-Friedberg Chambers of Commerce were: the wife of the CEO, Marina França Leder; Tim Müller (Deputy Director, Foreign Trade); Norbert Noisser (Senior Advisor Africa/China) and Dr. Kristen Albrecht (Head of Competence Centre Africa)