Akwa Ibom Govt. Dismisses NBS Report On Unemployment As Voodoo Statistics

The Akwa Ibom State Government on Monday dismissed as a voodoo statistics, the National Bureau of Statistics report which put Akwa Ibom as among two states with the highest rates of unemployment in the country.

Observing that election campaigns were over, the government in its reaction to the report expressed shock at the readiness of purveyors to project news directed purely for political goals.

The statement issued by the commissioner for information and strategy, Mr. Charles Udoh was in reaction to the National Bureau of Statistics which was widely published in the media on Monday.

“The report of the National Bureau of Statistics on the unemployment rate in Akwa Ibom State is nothing but “voodoo “statistics,” the government responded in its first reaction.

“To further buttress this point, in the same report, the NBS contradicted itself by saying that between third quarter, 2017 and third quarter of 2018, only Akwa Ibom and eight other states “recorded a reduction in their unemployment rates despite an increase in the national unemployment rates.” This finding contradicts the main conclusion of the NBS and renders the exercise spurious and utterly confounding.

Noting the widely acknowledged reports of the state government’s interventions in establishing industrial factories and facilitating private sector investments in the state, the commissioner said:

“So far, this policy has been achieved leading to the establishment of 16 industries that have employed thousands of our youths. The Akwa Ibom Employment and Enterprise Scheme (AKEES), has ignited in our youths an entrepreneurial and ownership mind-set and this, has seen our youths applying their creative resources to create employment for  themselves as part of our Dakkada philosophy.

“Because of the achievements recorded in the job and wealth creation agenda of Governor Udom Emmanuel’s Administration, youth restiveness has been greatly reduced, leading to the peace and safety we now enjoy in our State, which is one of the main reasons why foreign investors are trooping to the State.

“The Completion Agenda of Governor Udom Emmanuel as enunciated in the 2019 Manifesto will expand the job creation agenda horizon and further provide more opportunities for our people to be gainfully employed.

“We wish to emphasize here that the 2019 elections are over and cooking up unnecessary statistics to help certain narratives should be discouraged. Akwa Ibom is rising and will continue to be on the ascendance in the next four years of Governor Udom Emmanuel’s second term in office.”

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