Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo state has called on the Minister of Labour and Employment, Dr Chris Ngige and his Ministry of Internal Affairs counterpart, Abdulrahman Dambazau to put an end to the persistent abuse of expatriate quotas in the country.
Speaking when he visited Dr Ngige in his office in Abuja, Oshionhole said it is unacceptable for companies to bring unskilled expatriates to be doing jobs that unskilled Nigerians can handle.
“As you go round the country you will find unskilled expatriate doing the job unskilled Nigerians can do, I believe that this is unacceptable. I want to urge you to liaise with your counterpart in the Internal Affairs Ministry to revisit the process of issuance of expatriate quotas,” he said.
The governor also stressed the need for the Ministry of Labour and Employment to be proactive in addressing the challenge of unemployment in the country.
He also emphasized the critical role of the ministry in employment generation, workers’ protection and maintenance of industrial peace and harmony in the country.
“This ministry in the past years was noted for registration and placement of unemployed Nigerians in various job centres across the country thereby generating reliable data of unemployed youths as well as carry out regular trade test, do proper grading of skilled and semi-skilled and produce competent man-power through vocational training without necessarily attending higher institution.
“I believe sir that this is one area that we have neglected over the years and giving the commitment of the present administration to job creation we need to re-establish those units in all the state of the federation possibly in every Local Government Area for people who are qualified and willing to work to register,” he said.
He said this was necessary because the administration of President Muhmmadu Buhari has made it clear that the primary purpose of governance is the welfare of the people and the only way to deliver public welfare is to pay attention to job creation.
