Business
By Benprince Ezeh
ISA Ibrahim Pantami, minister for communications and digital economy, has said that Digital Nigeria Programme is to support digital innovation and entrepreneurship training for Nigerians.
This programme which was flagged off by President Muhammadu Buhari on March 19, 2020, will provide a national platform for improving the digital literacy of Nigerians.
At the official launch of the digital Nigeria portal and mobile app in Abuja, on Monday, September 28, the minister said that this platform will enable Nigerians from all walks of life to acquire high level digital skills.
“It will have a strong emphasis on skills for jobs and will include Nigerians in all strata of society, such as youth, women, children, internally displaced persons, people living with disabilities, etc.
“We are championing a paradigm shift that lays emphasis on skills, in preference to merely having degrees without skills. Degrees are only meant to validate skills. This is a growing trend across the globe. For instance, China recently started the process of turning 600 of the country’s general universities into skill centres,” he said.
According to him, “The president of the United States of America signed an Executive Order on the 26th of June, 2020, directing the federal government to lay emphasis on skills rather than degrees when hiring staff. The curriculum vitae of today should have 2 main parts – soft skills and hard skills.
“The digital literacy and skills pillar recognises the fact that citizens are the greatest assets in any economy, including the digital economy. It will support the development of a large pool of digitally literate and digitally skilled citizens,” Pantami said.
He said the ministry recently provided a platform to support the Digital Nigeria programme, enabling Nigerians to receive training in diverse digital skills. “As part of these efforts, I earlier launched another online academy executed by the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA. Over 40,000 Nigerians have enrolled across both platforms since the 2nd of April, 2020.
“Today, we are formally launching the www.digitalnigeria.gov.ng portal and the ‘Digital Nigeria’ Mobile App. We are committed to enabling Nigerians to acquire high-level digital skills from the comfort of their homes,” the minister said.
– Sept. 29, 2020 @ 12:44 GMT /
Tags: Digital Nigeria platform for improving literacy of citizens - Pantami
