BENEFICIARIES IN SIERRA LEONE TELL THEIR STORIES “When you have a skill, even if something bad happens in a country, you won’t have to hand it in. You won’t steal or hurt people willfully, and you won’t take a gun for a companion,” explains 21-year-old Malikie Kanneh.
by improving the entrepreneurial, leader- craftspeople to pass on their skills to ship and management skills of youth and others who had no experience of their diversifying income-generation activities craft, and then equipped them with the in the vulnerable communities. It is one tools they needed. These trainers were of seven projects implemented in Africa taught teaching and coaching skills, both by UNIDO under the umbrella title, to help them to teach better, and also to “Response to the humanitarian crisis in reinforce the message that their apprenAfrica”. The seven projects have been tices would be there to learn, not to work Kanneh has just completed a two-year funded by a $ 9.8m grant from the Gov- as low-paid labour. training programme to become a ernment of Japan. mechanic. He is one of the 145 young In the second stage, these craftspeople men and women who have benefited In the first stage of the programme in passed on their skills to others, like from a UNIDO project, funded by the eastern Sierra Leone, UNIDO selected Kanneh, who would otherwise have not Government of Japan, in Kailahun and 11 talented Sierra Leonean master- have had the opportunity to learn a skill. Koindu in eastern Sierra Leone, a rural By using this apprenticeship method, area bordering Liberia and Guinea. which is well-established and understood The project, which ran from March 2011 to September 2012, provided on-the-job training for apprentices to learn various entrepreneurial skills, including carpentry, smithing, welding, auto mechanics, tailoring and weaving. The objective of the project was to build the local economies’ resilience to shocks
Malikie Kanneh, apprentice mechanic.
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unido times | NOVEMber 2013
The project has been a great success, with about 70 per cent of the trainees starting their own income-generating activities or finding jobs with existing businesses.
in Sierra Leone, both trainers and trainees knew what was expected of them. To give a voice to some of those trainees who now have a livelihood thanks to the programme, Kanneh and others in Kailahun District, in eastern Sierra Leone, were interviewed and photographed. The following extracts were taken from the Voices of Kailahun blog.
Malikie Kanneh, apprentice mechanic
shop and pass on his newly acquired skills to others.
“For me, learning was not just about making money but it was also to avoid becoming a thief. I have never stolen anything, but I used to see the boys I played football with resort to that. I am a careful person and I don’t like stealing, so I wanted to go and learn something.” Malikie Kanneh is originally from Shegbwema, several hours from Kailahun Town, but he left home to come to Kailahun Town when he heard about the mechanics apprenticeship. Before the training, he didn’t know anything about mechanics or how to save money or develop a business. After two years of training, he is now able to repair machines even without his trainer present, and he now knows which steps to take to start his business.
“I can go and teach my own friends so that we can all be working for the development of the country and ourselves. When I help my friends, I am developing the country.”
Since the end of the civil war in 2002, rural eastern Sierra Leone has recovered slowly. A generation of young people experienced a decade of conflict that severely disrupted their education. Kanneh is convinced that by ensuring a livelihood for people he can play an active role in maintaining peace in Sierra Leone. As he puts it, “If someone said to me, ‘go and fight over there’, I would sit and think to myself, ‘Am I going to leave my garage, where I can earn 10,000 Le (€1.86) per day, just to go and fight over there?’ I Now the training has ended, this cheerful wouldn’t do it. With all the learning, I young man, who has started saving a don’t think that I will be influenced by part of his salary, wants to open his own anyone to do such things.”