From Geoffrey Anyanwu, Enugu

Eightyfour Nigerian youths have successfully completed their training in automobile maintenance at the Innoson Kiara Academy (IKA), Enugu, with a charge from their sponsors to be good ambassadors.

The 84 youths, who were among the 120 Industrial Training Fund (ITF) and Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA) 2021 sponsored trainees, graduated at a colourful ceremony held at the academy’s premises in Enugu.

The graduands, according to the academy, acquired during the training auto mechanic, auto electrical/electronics, auto fabrication and welding, auto spray-painting skills, with a general understanding of information technology and auto diagnosis using modern equipment.

They were issued certificates while the CEO award was given to the overall best trainee and also to the graduands who exhibited exemplary behaviour throughout the course of the training.

Addressing the graduands, the CEO of IKA, Mr. Endi Ezengwa, charged them to know that graduation was not the end but the beginning of the use of the skills they acquired to benefit society and earn their living.

Ezengwa commended ITF and NECA for the sponsorship, just as he praised some entrepreneurs from Abia State for sponsoring some of the trainees, assuring them that plans were on to put up other programmes that would give those who graduated from the academy more opportunities to explore the industry.

One of the directors, Mr. Alfred Nwosu, in his opening speech, urged the graduands to make the best of the opportunity they had, which the training had offered them.

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While urging them not to be dismayed by what they see today in the country, Nwosu charged them to use every knowledge they had gathered and to also mix their style with substance to achieve better results.

Head, ITF Enugu Area Office, Mrs. Uzoamaka Yahaya, and Mr. Samuel Chukwudi of NECA, in their speeches, commended the academy for the opportunity given to Nigerians, especially Igbo youths, to train and acquire useful skills.

Yahaya specifically applauded Abia people for sponsoring some of the trainees and asked the graduands to be good ambassadors of the state, while Chukwudi charged them to put what they learnt to work by applying their skills and training others.

The administrative manager, Joy Chijioke, thanked specifically, the chairman of Innoson Vehicle Manufacturing Company (IVM), Chief Innocent Chukwuma, for providing the platform, the academy.

Evaluating the training, she said, “Many of the graduands in different trade areas here today came here without any prior knowledge in their respective areas of training but today not only do they know something in these areas, some have gone ahead to distinguish themselves from the rest of the pack.”

She urged them to set a new course for the future, expressing optimism that, with what they had learnt in the academy, the next stage of their life that was about to begin would be brighter.

The high point of the graduation was the demonstration skills by the graduands in various specialisations.