By Victor Okoye
Kashifu Inuwa, the Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) says the creation of three million jobs in the digital technology sector was achievable within the next four years.
Inuwa made the remarks on the sidelines of a Public Sector Digital Innovation Summit on Thursday in Abuja organised by Datamellon in patnership with AWS (Amazon Web Services).
The DG who was represented by Bernard Ewah, the acting director, e-Government Development and Regulation at NITDA, said the agency was currently working with the public and the private sector to surpass the target before 2027.
He said through the initiative, Federal Government will work with stakeholders to train three million technical talents, prioritise job placement, and increase level of digital literacy of the population by 70 per cent by the end of 2027.
“If you look at the share size of our population that translates to potential producers of talents.
“Indeed, our talents have proven to be very productive in the country and are also recognised everywhere in the world.
“These can be seen in the number of innovations that have come out of Nigeria.
“The sheer size of demand for talents globally means that Nigeria is been modest in our projection, but we have to start somewhere and then scale up,” he said.
He noted that NITDA has always played a role in creating the right path towards developing talents for Nigeria.
He added the agency would continue to lend its support and work in collaboration with its partners on behalf of the Federal government and the Ministry of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy.
“NITDA is working with an ecosystem of partners to ensure that the right sets of policies and actions are taken to democratise the space.
“Our goal is to make it easier for not only government organisations to have Web presence but also for citizens to access services seamlessly.
“So, what we are experiencing today with the public sector innovation summit organised by Datamellon and AWS is a manifestation of NITDA’s age-long philosophy of engagement with a broad spectrum of stakeholders,” he said.
He stressed that government cannot do it alone, adding that all the relevant stakeholders must come together to ensure the success of the sector.
“For instance, even in our key mandate of developing policies, we no longer sit in our offices to develop policies.
“We engage and co-create policies, that is the only way that we can create policies that can be useful and highly impactful to stakeholders.
“So, policy making for us is not the perogative of NITDA alone. It involves the poor person on the street and that’s why this engagement is considered useful and important to us,” he said.
On his part, CEO of Datamellon, Wale Adedeji, said the summit was a groundbreaking event set to revolutionise public sector technology in the country.
Adedeji explained that the company is a digital firm dedicated to revolutionising the landscape of digital sector innovation.
“Our mission is to empower government and organisations with cutting-edge technology, enabling them to serve their citizens better, faster and smarter.
“In the digital age, data is the new currency and the overall goal of AWS is all about cost reduction and making sure that you get real value for whatever the services provided,” he said.
He said the objective of the summit, amongst others was to unlock the Power of AWS and explore how it is reshaping
government agencies’ operations with cutting-edge cloud solutions.
He said stakeholders engaged in interactive discussions and dived
into insightful conversations on leveraging AWS to enhance their organization’s efficiency and effectiveness.
“Participants also discovered Real-World Solutions and learned from real-life case studies featuring successful implementations of AWS Cloud
in public sector projects.
“They also had an opportunity of networking with experts and connect with industry professionals, government leaders, and AWS experts for valuable insights and collaborations,” he said.