_________________________

The Lango Presidential Zonal Industrial Hub hosted at Lira University in Lira City is enrolling another lot of 240 students.

The students are enrolling for training in skills development, including tailoring, hairdressing, carpentry, and joinery. Other short courses include welding and metal fabrication, bakery and confectionery, building and construction, and knitting.

This is the third intake after 459 students completed their first and second training. The trainings are in six-month intervals.

On September 26, 2023, hub acting manager Vicky Abura, the first lot of 220 learners completed training in January and was awarded certificates of level one. The second lot was released early this month (September 9).

Skills-enhancing initiative

In 2020, President Yoweri Museveni implored the Government to allocate shillings 130 billion for the construction of 21 zonal industrial hubs across the country to enhance youth skilling and training to reduce the lack of employment opportunities among youth.

The hub targeted disadvantaged youth aged between 18-32 years and since then it has operated on semester modules, two semesters every year, after which each learner is given a certificate.

The initiative aims at enabling unemployed youth to transition from job seekers to job creators, according to the director of Presidential projects and hubs, Raymond Kamugisha.   

Abura said the identification of the third beneficiaries has kicked off and they are expected to start reporting on October 11.

“We expect 21 students from each district including Lira city and Apac municipality,” Abura added.

Politicians meddling

Two weeks ago, the chairperson of the board of governors, who is also Apac Resident District Commissioner, Abdul George raised concerns over the identification of the beneficiaries saying there was a lot of political inference.

He said there were incidents where people who received the forms hid themselves somewhere and picked only people in one or two sub-counties and claimed it for the whole district.

Abura cited the Dokolo district where the beneficiaries were picked from only two sub-counties (Agwata and Adok) and then submitted and later there were a lot of complaints.

“In Kole district, I gave the form to the chairperson of the National Resistance Movement (NRM) party, but he hid it and wrote only the names of his close friends and relatives,” Abura said.

She added that the district leadership later rejected the list submitted to them then another list was also generated.

Dokolo Resident District Commissioner Barbra Akech said to avoid the previous incidents they held a meeting with all the stakeholders and distributed the forms to each sub-county in the district.

She added that to ensure that the right people get picked, they have instituted the sub-county vetting committee headed by the chairperson and are due to furnish them with the names soon.

“We want to pick the right people who are willing to study unlike in the previous intakes where the management of the hub said some students were not willing, others were drug abusers, criminals, and drunkards.    

Abura also explained they have resolved that to ensure transparency in the process every leader mentioned in the form must be signed and stamped to avoid unnecessary doubts.