The rate of early school leavers in Sierra Leone is considerably high, many of the early school leavers falls within the youth’s age brackets of 18-35 years and most of such youths remained unemployed in some parts of the country.
Some of these youths on daily basis struggle to make their ends meet, so they take up to doing odd jobs, involving in cliques, arm rubbery groups etc as their means for survival. They are therefore, called names and are mostly referred to as thieves, half baits, Idlers, Gangsters, Drop-outs and more.
Munafa-M’Patie Foundation a leading local Non-Governmental Organization with support from Child Fund Child Fund International Sierra Leone has on Friday 15th March, 2019 graduated eighty youths selected from Biriwa, Safroko Limba and Paki Masabong Chiefdom.
These 80 male and female youths have successfully gone through various Vocational Training Skills in Agriculture and Survey, Business Management, Construction and Building, Carpentry, Tailoring, Home Management and Catering, to name but a few from the Sierra Leone Opportunities and Industrialization Center (SLOIC) situated in Makeni, Bombali District.
The ceremony which took place at the prestigious Wusum Hotel in Makeni, Bombali District, have been referred to by many pundicts as another commendable stride in youths empowerment taken by Munafa-M’Patie Federation for the youths in some of the most deprived communities in the district.
Speaker after speaker of invited guests, that comprise of project beneficiaries, parents, partners, and other stakeholders including the newly elected and inaugurated President of Munafa-M’Patie Federation Bombali, Mr. Mohamed Sahid Kamara all at the graduation ceremony thanked the federation and urged the 80 graduated youths to make good use of the trainings and supplies they have acquired.
They also extended their deepest thanks and appreciation to Child Fund International Sierra Leone for providing funds to Munafa-M’Patie Federation to fully support youths of Biriwa, Safroko Limba and Paki Masabong Chiefdom.
“This is not the first time we are empowering youths, we in Munafa-M’Patie Federation believes in reviving lost hopes of people in less privilege communities and that our gestures here today is just one among the many services we do provide for individuals that falls within the category of neglect and cracks of society” Munafa-M’Patie Federation Program manager, Mr. Musa Sanu Konteh revealed to this medium in an exclusive interview.
Mr. Konteh further urged the 80 graduated youths to make proper use of the knowledge and material supplies that have received from the Federation as they head to the cooperate world.
He further extended on behalf of Munafa-M’Patie Federation appreciation for the efforts and supports of its donor partner Child Fund International Sierra Leone, MDA’s, Sierra Leone Opportunities and Industrialization Center (SLOIC), and attendees of the graduation ceremony, for joining hands with Munafa-M’Patie Federation to empower the youths, a set of individuals he described as the hopes of every nation.
He also spoke about several challenges faced by the federation, pressing among the challenges faced he said is seeking for additional funds from donor organizations and agencies to address some of the problems presented to them by other communities and he therefore called on other National and International donor Partners like European Union, USAID and others to come to Bombali District and render financial support to the Federation to enable them the more to improve and transform communities and residents of most deprived places to enable them compliment government’s efforts.
It is also, worth noting that, Munafa-M’Patie Federation have been providing other services such as the provision of Health facilities, Child protection, early Childhood care and Development, Educational facilities, Youth facilities, and many more services to numerous communities and in less than a week ago, the Federation have handed over the first ever Early Childhood Development Center to the People of Paki Masabong Chiefdom that was constructed with support from Child Fund International Sierra Leone that will provide basic Numeracy and Literacy Services to Children that have never been opportune to be enrolled to Formal School in the chiefdom.
At the apex of the graduation ceremony tools, bags of rice, cooking oils and other materials were supplied to the graduated youths to help them start up their careers independently.
©: Northern Times Newspaper✍🏾
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