Edo awaits Obaseki’s promise of 200,000 jobs
When he made the promise to create 200, 000 jobs, as part of his electioneering campaign in July 2016, the All Progressives Congress, APC flag bearer, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, the businessman turned politician and now Governor of Edo state did not leave many in doubt of his ability to deliver. However, close to two years in office, official figures of jobs so far created, is way off the mark in this analysis

On 16th July 2016, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate in the Governorship polls in Edo, promised to create more than 200,000 jobs, if elected as governor. He made the pledge before a huge crowd and at the launching his campaign at the Samuel Ogbemudia Stadium in Benin City when he said that the focus of his administration, if elected, would be job creation, entrepreneurship and industrialization.

Obaseki explained that most of the jobs would be created not in th estate civil service but through agriculture and skills acquisition, adding that agriculture would be moved from subsistence to commercial agriculture even as his administration plans to make Edo the agriculture hub of the country.

By November 21, 2016, elections over, while taking the oath of office as governor, Mr. Obaseki declared, “Today, as we begin our journey to build a new Edo State, I want to repeat and affirm that promise to create 200,000 in the next four years”.

He said, “…we will achieve this by leveraging our comparative advantages and our key factor endowments in production and commerce. We will focus on commerce and agro-business value chain, entrepreneurship, investment in industries and technical and vocational skills”
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Long before the promise, and as head of the Edo state Economic team Mr. Obaseki obviously aware that he would be the APC flag bearer said that he will create the 200,000 jobs essentially outside the civil service system. He said, “Mark my words. I will create jobs but not in the civil service. You cannot create 200,000 jobs in the civil service. The civil service is not where the bulk of the jobs in the society are created.

The jobs are created in the private sector by expanding the economy. I would specifically identify where the jobs would be created. Our government’s role is to enable things to happen. That’s the principle function of government. What you do is to look at the activities centre and you create what we call stimulants to happen”.

He disclosed that agriculture would create a large number of the jobs he promised, as the state government issued out C of O (Certificates of Occupancy) to 12 large companies “who have expressed interest to come and cultivate various crops in Edo State on a total of 150,000 hectares of land.

“These are companies that are going to be involved in large scale commercial farming. The rule of thumb is that if it takes about five people to cultivate an hectare using tractors, different implements and activities, what will be the multiplier effect of the number of people working in 150,000 hectares of land in four years?”

Few months into office the state government announced that it had employed 4,200 youths across the state under the Edo state public works programme. In addition he approved the engagement and training of 50 civil engineers to supervise the programme, across 45 inner city roads selected under the special window.

At that time, the governor promised to engage another set of 4,200 in August 2017, under another window for the construction and maintenance of another set of 55 roads, culminating in almost 100 kilometres across the state.

By June 2017, the Edo state Universal Basic Education (SUBEB), declared 77 vacancies and called on interested individuals to apply for employment, noting that the vacancies were only open to current staff of the Edo State Civil Service as well as those who registered in the ongoing Edo Jobs programme.

The Office of the Governor revealed that applicants interested in the appointments were to apply to the Office of the Interim Chairman, State Universal Basic Education Board, Benin City with 5 copies of their applications, which should contain a typewritten cover letter detailing sustainability for the position and curriculum vitae.

It would be recalled that Edo State also called for unemployed citizens of the state to register in the ongoing Edo Jobs initiative, which was established to collate bio-data of unemployed people in the state and match them with jobs when available. This was pursuant to Governor Godwin Obaseki’s promise to provide at least 200,000 jobs for unemployed citizens in the state.

In November 2017, the government reiterated its determination to create more jobs through entrepreneurship and the development of small and medium enterprises using skill acquisition. This was the State Commissioner for Wealth Creation, Cooperatives and Employment, Mr. Emmanuel Usoh speaking in Benin City.

Usoh said the state government would utilize skill acquisition centres across the state to empower as many youths as possible, stressing that Edo State government is prepared to support those who are willing to acquire skills and remain relevant in the ever dynamic world.

He expressed delight that the group’s vision is in sync with the state government’s job creation plans and empowerment especially at the grassroots aimed at making people self reliant. He said the state government would do all within its reach to sustain the partnership with those who are prepared to become entrepreneurs through direct funding of small and medium scale enterprises by the development partners like the Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN), Bank of Industry, among others.

Usoh also used the opportunity to reiterate the state government’s commitment to create 200,000 jobs within the first four years of the present administration led by Governor Godwin Obaseki as a way of empowering the youths.

Keen on keeping his job promise on the front burner, Obaseki approaching his second year in office has promised that his administration would facilitate the job creation process he campaigned about by establishing several job incubation centres in the state. He said this aims to upgrade the skills of job seekers to meet the needs of what he called the present day labour market.

He said the job incubation centres would be located within the industrial parks/estates, which his administration is setting up in the state. He added, “We want to create several job incubation centres/hubs, where job seekers will be trained and employed by the companies that will be located in the several industrial parks, to be established in the state”.

The groundbreaking of the first major industrial park in the state also took place in November 2017 as the governor marked one year in office and at a time the first 50,000 jobs were due. The park valued at N200billion is located at Iyanomo on the outskirts of Benin City and according to the governor will create 170, 000 out of the projected 200, 000 as direct and indirect jobs, upon completion.

Governor Obaseki said the industrial park which is a public-private partnership initiative is the first in the series to establish in the state to make Edo an Industrial hub. He added, “I promised that if I become the governor of Edo State I will create the enabling environment for businesses to thrive and improve the quality of lives of our people. Our goal to industrialize Edo is already yielding results and our hope is to create employment for thousands of people in the state.”

He also said that the gas that will power the industrial park already exists within the park’s location and assured that the park would be built within 12 months even as he said that the private sector would contribute about 74 percent share of investments to the industrial park and will host about 1000 companies when fully completed at a future date.

“We have also commenced the design of an industrial park and incubation centre on the premises of the Benin Technical College, which will house technology and data companies. The third industrial centre will be located at Ikpoba Hill area of the state and we have concluded plans to partner with the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) to build a 2MW hydro plant that will produce electricity from Ikpoba River dam to power the industrial estate to be located in the area,” he explained.

Obaseki said that his administration would not relent in formulating the necessary policies and programmes that would empower youths to fit into the emerging economy that his administration is creating. “We have the potential to create all we want as we have the base materials, so we have to prepare our youths to fit into these new jobs we intend to create via training,” he said.

He added that his administration would also key into the emerging employment opportunities in agriculture, housing, education and health sectors to create jobs for the youths.

Outside the parks, the government has commenced a pilot scheme code-named “Edo Jobs”, where it hopes to create jobs for over 200,000 job seekers. The EdoJobs initiative trained a batch of 500 youths late last year, and also supplied over 4,000 people trained by the National Directorate of Employment (NDE) this year.

“EdoJobs” is an employment initiative of Godwin Obaseki-led administration to train and retrain graduates with post-secondary school certificates on business writing, workplace ethics, problem-solving skills, emotional intelligence and managing conflicts, among others. The initiative gives applicants the opportunity for job placements in companies across the state.

The portal provides the state government with data of applicants, which it uses for planning skills training for the job seekers in collaboration with companies requiring skilled labour. Officials says the unemployed could potentially register under the scheme and promised to operate it through a decentralized system. The scheme hopes to encourage residents across all the local governments in the state to register in their local government councils to, “broaden the programme’s reach and attempt to involve everyone in the state”.

The scheme the officials added is for the “jobs” that are available in the areas of Agriculture, revenue collection officers, traffic management and waste management. In addition the government has since advised participants who do not have interest in these areas to still register and indicate their areas of interests as they would be invited when such jobs are available. It added that the registration process would include collation of biometric data for all Edo residents while the minimum age is 18. No maximum age has however been set.

Special Adviser to the Governor on Media and Communication Strategy, Mr Crusoe Osagie, the governor said the portal which was shut down at a time would extend the window of opportunities for more youths to be captured in the state’s jobs database, assuring that the Obaseki administration is committed to fulfilling the campaign promise of creating 200,000 jobs for the teeming unemployed youths.

Obaseki spoke about the portal himself when he said, “The reopening of the job portal is to capture more youths in the state, who are to undergo employability and capacity building training. After their training, these youths will be matched with employers of labours, who have indicated interest in employing young people.

“It is clear that we have a crisis of youth unemployment and we are making frantic efforts to address it. There are various options the applicants on the jobs portal can choose from”.

However not a few doubted the capacity of the businessman turned politician to make good on his campaign promise. Among the lot is Pastor. Osagie Ize-Iyamu. Soon after Obaseki made the promise in 2016, the clergyman and PDP governorship candidate in the same election that brought Obaseki into office urged Edo people not to be deceived by the promise.

He said, “when Governor Adams Oshiomhole assumed office in 2008 with the APC governorship candidate, Mr. Godwin Obaseki as the Head of Economic Team, he promised to create 100,000 jobs in each year of his administration, meaning that 800,000 new jobs would have been created over eight years.

“But Oshiomhole did not kept his promise. The governor and his economic team have not succeeded in replacing those they retired from Edo State Civil Service. What more? Almost all the thriving business — Bendel Breweries Limited, Okpella Cement Factory, Ewu Flourmill, Michelin, Edo Transport Service, which the APC inherited from PDP, have collapsed because of the suffocating business environment Oshiomhole and his economic team deliberately created in the state in the last seven and a half years.’’

He added that data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) show that Edo State presently has one of the highest rates of youth unemployment in the country adding the present high rate of unemployment in Edo State is largely responsible for the predominant incidence of youth restiveness and crimes in the state.

At least 4,000 Edo youths have been repatriated from Libya where they had trekked to in search for greener pastures since 2016 when Obaseki made his promise. The Edo state PDP chairman Chief Dan Orbih said the state government’s failure to fulfill it campaign promise of creating 200,000 jobs for the youths was responsible for the massive migration of Edo youths to the North African country and other countries in search of greener pastures.

Orbih noted that Edo people were experiencing extreme poverty, hunger and neglect due to Obaseki’s failure as he alleged that the economic challenges and security issues faced in Edo were as a result of Obaseki’s government failure.

Possible to achieve.