AGI, Scholarships Secretariat to create ‘labour bank’ as 50 students receive Hungarian scholarships

The Association of Ghana Industries (AGI) is collaborating with the Scholarships Secretariat to create a ‘labour bank’ to allow industries and businesses to easily source the requisite manpower for growth, the Registrar of the Secretariat, Mr Kingsley Agyemang, has disclosed.

He said the labour bank, an initiative from the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo government, was a laudable initiative.

Mr Agyemang made this known in Accra last Monday when the secretariat held a reception in honour of 50 Ghanaian students who will be on Hungarian/Ghana government scholarships.

“The purpose is that if for instance, there is a company from Hungary seeking to invest in Ghana, the company will not look further than the labour bank had there been one in place from the previous governments,” Mr Agyemang said.

“We want to get to a point where we can export excess labour to the neighbouring countries,” he said and added that Ghana would want to replicate the Cuban style where its economy thrived on medical and educational export.

He thanked President Akufo-Addo for introducing such a laudable idea which had linked academia with industry.

Appreciation

Mr Agyemang expressed the secretariat’s appreciation to the Hungarian government for the assistance, stating that aside the benefits Ghana stood to gain from the support, “Hungary is reputed to be one of the best countries in the world for academic pursuits at the tertiary levels.”

He further revealed that more than 3,000 students applied for the Hungarian scholarship out of which 50 were selected, stressing that although the selection process was rigorous, the secretariat had no shred of doubt that the best students were picked.

He touched on the government’s determination to commit more resources  into education.

Mr Agyemang commended the President for ensuring that the Scholarships Secretariat, which had been neglected for a long time, was back on its feet to help Ghanaian students.

He also said through the secretariat’s collaboration with the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) and the support from government, scholarship funds that were unutilised had been retrieved from headteachers and that had ensured that the secretariat was able to settle supplementary allowances and other entitlements to students in various countries.

Assurance

The Registrar told the students that the era when they were abandoned and denied their stipends were over.

“You have a government in place that understands education, you have a government that understands welfare, you have a government that listens. We can assure you that we will provide dispatch services to all students. For us at the secretariat, you are our clients,” he said.

The Founder and President of the Worldwide Miracle Outreach, Dr Lawrence Tetteh, who played a crucial role in the Hungarian scholarship deal, said the Hungarian environment was very much open for higher studies and asked the students to take advantage of it, especially, their language.

He stated that Ghana had benefitted from Hungary in diverse ways, including areas such as pharmaceutical and engineering, among others.

“The environment in Hungary is not like many European countries where you are allowed to work outside studies. In Hungary, you are paid and made comfortable to have the peace of mind to study,” he said.