The Nigerian Government has commissioned an automotive training centre of the National Automotive Design and Development Council (NADDC) in Ebonyi State to promote technical skills development and job creation.
The centre was commissioned on Friday in Abakaliki, the state capital.
Speaking at the event, Governor Francis Nwifuru urged automobile manufacturers, investors and indigenous entrepreneurs to take advantage of the council’s presence in the state.
He said Ebonyi State would provide an enabling environment for technology transfer, local capacity development and sustainable job creation.
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Nwifuru noted that the NADDC facility was the first automotive training centre to be commissioned in the South-East.
The governor described the facility as a significant step in Ebonyi’s industrialisation drive.
He stressed that it was designed not merely to train automobile mechanics but to develop a new generation of technicians, engineers, innovators and entrepreneurs capable of driving the state’s emerging industrial economy.
“For us, this Centre is not an extension of the regular mechanic site just down there; it is an investment in the future in the automotive technology context,” Nwifuru stressed.
He explained that the project represented a practical convergence of the Nigerian Government’s Renewed Hope Agenda and his administration’s People’s Charter of Needs, particularly in human capital development, technical education, technology and productive enterprise.
Nwifuru urged Ebonyi youths to take advantage of the facility and discard the perception that technical education was inferior to conventional education.
“Technical knowledge is not inferior knowledge,” he maintained, noting that properly trained automobile technicians could become entrepreneurs, while automotive engineers and fabricators could establish businesses, develop components and create employment.
The Minister of State for Industry, Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, Sen. John Enoh, said the project reflected the commitment of the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu-led administration to skills development, human capital development and industrialisation.
Enoh identified skills development as one of the major requirements for industrial growth.
The NADDC Director-General and Chief Executive Officer, Mr Oluwemimo Joseph Osanipin, said the centre was established to provide practical, industry-relevant training for youths, technicians, artisans, students, entrepreneurs and other automotive practitioners in Ebonyi and the South-East.
The commissioning attracted government officials, engineers, automobile technicians, industry stakeholders, traditional and political leaders, development partners and youths from across the state.
