Senator Gershom Bassey Empowers 200 Youth on Solar Power, Inverters Installation & Maintenance

By Jake Clifford

Senator Gershom Bassey, Senator representing Cross River Southern Senatorial District and Chairman, Senate Committee on FERMA in partnership with NFKZ PRIME Solution Nigeria organized a 5-day technical training on installation & maintenance of solar street lights and inverters for youth in Cross River Southern Senatorial District.

A 5-day entrepreneurship skill development training program for 200 beneficiaries was sponsored by Gershom Bassey.

At the graduation ceremony in Calabar on the weekend, the lawmaker representing the Cross River Southern Senate District, represented by his Director General, DG, Hon. Ekpo Ada clarified that on Monday 11 January 2021, the five-day empowerment training began and ended on Friday 15 January 2021.

Ekpo Ada, the exercise was in line with his determination to ensure that he empowers as many of his constituents to achieve economic self-sustainability, according to Gershom Bassey.

In his remarks, Gershom said, "We have faced two choices in view of the economic challenges Nigeria has faced in the past few years, and the impact on most Nigerians."

The first is whether to sit down and complain about the decline in the availability of jobs, or the second is whether to square our shoulders and face the challenge in order to get into the drive for diversification by acquiring entrepreneurial skills and contributing to the rejuvenation of our economy with our quota.

"Obviously, the more sensible second option has been adopted and I am pleased to say that we are already seeing the advantage."

Participants were trained in such areas as solar power, installation of inverters, maintenance, and general electronic repairs.

At the end of the program, in addition to obtaining attendance certificates, participants were also encouraged with a cash gift of N100,000 to enable them to start up.

Many who took part in the skill acquisition training for the installation of inverters were also given full boxes of instruments to assist them in repair work.

Howver, charged beneficiaries to take advantage of the training knowledge they have acquired and to ensure that they impart the knowledge to others so that they can benefit from what they have learned as well.

It is instructive to remember that this was not the first time in Cross River South that Senator Gershom Bassey had train components.

They will be interested in the continuous construction by FERMA of solar street lights and maintenance.