Youths in Coast region are set to upscale their digital skills for gainful self-employment following the launch of a second Jitume Digital Lab in the region at the Kenya Coast National Polytechnic in Mombasa by Information, Communication and Technology and Digital Economy CS, Eliud Owalo earlier today. The first lab in the Coast was launched in Kwale earlier in the year.
The Jitume Digital Enablement Program is a national government digital initiative aimed at equipping at least one million youths with skills and necessary infrastructure to enable them take part in the digital economy and create the millions of jobs President Ruto promised hustlers. It encourages the youth to take it upon themselves to access digital devices to learn and be certified in digital skills for the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
“Today’s launch is the 40th Jitume Digital Hub since we started this program last December. We will admit 300 students broken into three batches of 100 each and run it on a rolling basis across the coast region. They will be trained in digital skills in readiness for the formal and informal economies,”
said Mr Owalo.
The Mombasa lab is fitted with 100 computers to serve the youths in turns and will follow the same model used in previous launches where registration is on a first come first served basis.
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The CS noted that over 12,000 youths have since benefitted, with over 6,800 virtual desktop infrastructures (VDIs) deployed and called for more partnerships with bilateral financiers and the private sector to accelerate connecting more graduates with the Jitume Kazi work hub.
“We have so far deployed 114 centres. We expect to launch the remaining 74 Jitume Labs across the country by the end of next month to keep pace our target of 200 Jitume Centres by the end of this financial year,”
said Eng. John Tanui, PS Ministry of ICT & DE, who also spoke at the same event after spending the weekend launching public Wi-Fi hotspots across the coast in Marikiti Market in Mombasa town, Akamba Handicraft Market in Changamwe and Diani Market in Ukunda, Kwale County
The government has doubled down on enhancing internet access to buttress the bet on ICT to transform the economy and hopes the youth join the digital fray to tap into the new jobs and careers that did not exist ten years ago, such as transcription, editing, photography, blogging, professional online training, software as a service, artistic performance and many others. The Ministry targets to deploy some 25,000 such spots countrywide.
CS Owalo reiterated that in the quest to achieve a transformative digitally enabled economy, the Kenya Kwanza government, through his Ministry is focused on scaling the Jitume Digital Program, Digital Superhighway, Wi-Fi Hotspots, 1450 Innovation Hubs, Digitization & Konza Technopolis.
Last week President William Ruto inaugurated the first virtual university, Open University of Kenya (OUK) based at Konza Technopolis during which he promised over Sh100 billion over the next five year to upscale Africa’s Silicon Savanna as a global competitiveness hub. The Open University, seen as an anchor of sorts at Konza will help democratize access to higher education by drawing on modern technology to leapfrog barriers in distance, space and cost that hinder access to quality education and opportunities.
In December 2022, President Ruto conceived the Jitume program to complement and build on the successes made by the existing Digital Enablement Programmes such as Ajira Digital & the Kenya Youth Employment Programme.