The National Directorate of Employment (NDE) said it would capture no fewer than two million women and youths in Ebonyi in its ongoing registration of the unemployed in the country.

The Coordinator of the agency in the state, Mr Don Anaba, said this in Abakaliki on Friday.

Mr Anaba said that the registration started on April 17 and ended on May 5.

He also said that the essence of the registration was to have the full statistics of unemployed persons across the country.

He said that the measure would help the federal government to make proper plan for them and also take them out of the streets.

Mr Anaba hailed the turnout for the exercise, saying the registration was done at the NDE state office and headquarters of the 13 Local Government Areas of the state.

“The local government indegeneship, valid means of identification (NIN), permanent home address and contact phone numbers were among the requirements for the registration.

“Yes, the turnout was enormous in the state.

“We have captured so many of them and I believe at the end, we will have no fewer than two million unemployed Ebonyi persons in our database.

“The exercise was hitch-free, only that there were so much crowd at the local government level and the state capital.

“This exercise is going to help the Federal Government in terms of creating employment.

“The programme is not an empowerment.

“It is to have the database of the unemployed persons, which would in turn enable the government to have and make plans for them,” Mr Anaba said.

On the fight against unemployment in the country, he said that the federal government was not relenting in its job creation efforts.

“I urge the youths to embrace and support the federal government’s policies aimed at job creation and reduction in youth restiveness in society,” Mr Anaba further said.

One of the registrants, Miss Chikere Nkwor, thanked NDE and the federal government for the “wonderful initiative”, geared toward reducing the unemployment rate in the country.

(NAN)