The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has conferred on Huawei Technologies Company Nigeria Limited an award for driving digital economy among other private sector companies in the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) industry in Nigeria.
Presenting the award for Digital Economy Promotion to Huawei at the just-concluded E-Nigeria Conference 2019 organised by NITDA in Abuja, the IT regulatory government agency commended Huawei for its “progressive achievements and contribution to the significant development of ICT in Nigeria through collaboration with the Nigerian government and other industry players.”
“In the past twenty years, Huawei has been working with operators and other partners in building backbone networks spanning over 8,000km, connecting 36 states and FCT, and developed over 24,000 mobile base stations, covering half of the country’s population,” NITDA stated at the award ceremony.
The 2-day E-Nigeria event, which was hosted by NITDA under the guidance of the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy and in collaboration with public and the private sectors as well as Non-Governmental Organizations and the academia, focused on digital transformation as a tool for achieving a productive national economy.
Daily Trust reports that discussions at the conference focused on creating new job opportunities and economic development through technological innovation, while harnessing indigenous innovation and creativity for poverty reduction in Nigeria.
In his opening remark at the event, President Muhammadu Buhari tasked government offices and agencies to utilize digital innovation to enhance efficiency and effectiveness in its service delivery, and for creating seamless synergy across board.
“Our recent introduction of the Nigerian e-government Masterplan will further consolidate our successes to date and increase interoperability among the different Ministries, Departments and Agencies of government.
“A key requirement of the e-government Master plan is for all government institutions to create a Digital Transformation Technical Working Group that will work with the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy to ensure seamless and coordinated implementation of projects, programs and policies…
“Furthermore, the Nigerian e-Government Interoperability Framework, the Enterprise Architecture and the Nigeria Data Protection Regulation are in place and all Ministries, Departments and Agencies are expected to comply with these policies,” President Buhari had said at the conference.
Receiving the award on behalf of Huawei, a representative of the company in a goodwill message said: “Nigeria has embarked on a journey to reposition itself as the heartbeat and reference point in Africa and Huawei is committed to being a part of this journey to boost availability, accessibility and affordability of ICT services to turn digital inclusion to social and economic inclusion.”
Also commenting on the award, the Deputy Managing Director and Head of Public Relations, Huawei Nigeria Limited, Kelvin Yangyang, noted that to effectively achieve a digital Nigeria, capacity building of Nigerians in ICT is paramount.
“Huawei has been investing strongly in digital skills in Nigeria. Huawei has upskilled more than 20,000 ICT professionals in the industry in the last 20 years.
“Huawei trained 2,000 Nigerian youths in core ICT skills and empowered 1,000 civil servants in 2019 under the ICT for Change partnership with the Federal Government.
“Beside the ICT industry, Huawei is working with more than 60 Nigerian universities in Nigeria to establish the Huawei Authorized Information and Network Academy, providing the industry-recognized ICT certification including networks, clouding computing and big data,” Yangyang said.
Dignitaries at the event include the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Pantami; the Director-General of NITDA, Kashifu Abdullahi; the Chairman, Senate Committee on Communications, Senator Oluremi Tinubu; Representative of the Speaker, Honourable Lado, among others.
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