Skill Acquisition & Empowerment The Role of the Catholic Church towards the Youths and Skills Acquisition in Jalingo Metropolis, Taraba State-Nigeria

Abstract

Youths are said to be the future leaders of any country in the world, Nigeria inclusive. It is also a general belief that government all over the world try to invest strategically in her youth for them to be able to assume the position of leadership when the time comes. In spite of this, it appears that the training, the investment of the Nigerian governments as well as the socialization of youth in Nigeria and Taraba State in particular, seem to be inadequate because many of them instead of contributing meaningfully to the development of the society, they are doing otherwise. The Catholic Church in one of its spirited effort to combat this problem introduced the Skills Acquisition Programme to develop, empower and engage the youth in the State. This theoretical study, therefore, assessed the role of the Catholic Church in skill acquisition, employment opportunities for youth beneficiaries, reduce their involvement in social vices, improved their standard of living. The main thrust of this paper, therefore, is to showcase to the world how the catholic church as contributed in youth development and also to continue to challenge the Church as a model and vital social institution to use its gifts, resources and experiences to help young people become useful citizens. The recommendations that were made include: (a) that the church should facilitate the on-going reforms in the financial sector with the aim of reducing the obstacles in obtaining soft loans. The church should influence government policy to properly stream-line an efficient process of registering a business or enterprise with the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC).