The national government has urged Form Four leavers who did not attain university or mid-level college grades to seek placement in technical training institutions to acquire practical job skills.
Interior Principal Secretary Raymond Omollo said the government has committed Sh600 billion to support education of young Kenyans from the lowest level to highest level.
The 2023 Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education results showed that more than half (494,317) of the 899,453 candidates scored Grade D+ and below. These candidates did not qualify to join university or mid-level colleges.
Omollo urged this group of Form Four leavers to pursue further skills in areas like building and construction in the Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVETs) colleges.
The PS said youths with technical skills from TVET colleges had higher chances of becoming self-employed.
“Emphasis is put on acquiring technical skills because they will be able to be employed in the affordable housing project that is being undertaken by the government,” Omollo said.
He spoke during the funeral for Francis Acholla Orata, a former civic leader, at Kayandoto ward in Ndhiwa constituency.
Youth unemployment is one of the major challenges that the Kenya Kwanza government is struggling to address.
Omollo said President William Ruto's government has introduced several programmes to economically empower the youth.
Among them is digital literacy, which has been rolled out via digital laboratories set up by the Ministry of ICT and Digital Economy.
According to PS Omollo, the government has allocated huge sums of money to develop human capital.
He said young people must be supported to gain the digital skills to expose them to the outside world and to earn a living.
“Laws have also been amended to permit the National Government Constituency Development Fund to establish digital laboratories at the constituency level for youths to develop digital skills,” the PS said.
Another proposal for addressing youth unemployment, the PS said, is agriculture. He said crop and livestock production was key to self-employment and solving food insecurity. Kenya depends on agriculture as one of the pillars of the economy.
Omollo said President Ruto has provided farmers with subsidised fertiliser in an effort to ensure the country is food secure.
He told farmers to take advantage of the programme to reduce cost of production while maximising on profit.
“Kenyan youths can easily earn by growing crops and selling the produce to the market. Agriculture can be less costly if farmers take advantage of government support programmes,” the PS said.
Omollo assured former councillors who were present at the event that the government was considering factoring their pension pay into next year’s budget.
“We had this conversation with the late councillor Orata and I want to assure his colleagues that this government will not let them down,” he said.
The PS said the financial budget 2024/25 was being prepared and promised to meet the former civic leaders to iron out their issues and front a strong case.
He said President Ruto’s administration would not neglect the former civic leaders who laid a strong foundation for devolution.
