Dangote academy admits 100 trainees for JTS

Dangote Academy has admitted a new set of 100 youths for training towards acquisition of technical skills and leadership ability for capacity development and empowerment.

Inaugurating the newly admitted students at the Dangote Cement Plant in Obajana in Kogi State recently, the President Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote said the Junior Technical Scheme (JTS) batch three and four comprising 100 trainees from Obajana and Ibese will provide various technical abilities to the youths.

Areas of specialisation for the training as provided by the curriculum include mechanical, electrical maintenance trainings with 80 percent technical and 20 percent class work.

Aliko Dangote who was represented by the Group Executive Director, G.V.D Edwin, noted that the academy was established in 2010 to serve as talent pipeline for the Dangote Group while filling the industrial skills gap in Nigeria.

He pointed out that the move was in recognition of the fact that industries cannot rely solely on Universities and Colleges of Technology to provide the specialised technical and managerial training required to run major modern industrial factories such as Dangote Cement factory, particularly in the large numbers of personnel they required to run their operations all over the country and outside Nigeria.

According to him, within and outside Nigeria, Dangote has synergy with reputable institutions such as German Association of Equipment Manufacturers, (VDMA) and Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET), and the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) for capacity development.

He hinted that the first set were admitted in 2014 most of whom are now working in different Units within the Dangote Group while a few others are working in other manufacturing Plants across Nigeria.He added: “At the end of the 18 months training program at the academy, these 100 young Nigerians which cut across all the states of the federation will become master technicians mainly in electrical installations and maintenance, welding and fabrication, machining and fitting, mechanical maintenance and instrumentation.”

He reiterated that Dangote Group believes strongly in human capacity development, hence the massive investment in both physical infrastructure and human capacity development training programmes.

Dangote said the training curriculum is not limited to engineering but several other fields of human endeavours including risk management, financial management, health, safety and environment, security, leadership, sales, marketing, communications and entrepreneurship.