By ZAKAA LAZARUS
Corps Employers in the country have been advised to provide enabling environments that would enable the potentials of Corps Members serving with them to bring out initiatives that would add value to the society.
The Director General of National Youth Service Corps, Brigadier General Olakunle Nafiu, gave the advice during the launching of National Information Technology Development Agency
(NITDA) Innovation Space, tagged; “idea2impact”, held at NITDA Headquarters in Abuja.
He said Corps Members are solution providers that must be mentored, guided and provided with effective leadership.
While commending NITDA for the unique opportunity given the Corps Members to show their ingenuity, General Nafiu described the “idea2impact” project as a viable opportunity for them to display their creativity as solution providers.
“The youths we have at the NYSC are solution providers and l want to challenge, ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), private entities and other establishments to tap into their wealth of experiences and skills to create solutions for the larger society”.
“I am proud of the Corps Members that have come out here to speak. There is a future for this Scheme and it’s still relevant in our system”.
“This initiative is a viable one and it is a way of opening doors of opportunities to these young Nigerians”, General Nafiu said.
He stated further that the Scheme has digitized Corps Members’ identity cards alongside other technological innovations since he assumed duty.
In his remarks, the Director General of NITDA, Mr Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, said the agency would continue to empower young Nigerians to adjust and adapt to new changes in the ICT world.
He added that there was the need to have a skill and good career plan in order to succeed in life, and also harped on the importance of personal strategy for Corps Members before they enter the labour market.
The NITDA DG, who served 22 years ago as a graduate of Computer Science, added that he utilized the opportunities of the service year positively. He thereby urged Corps Members to strive and create visibility for themselves with their skills.
According to Inuwa, NITDA had created several opportunities for the Corps Members to unleash their potentials. He disclosed further that some of them who served with the agency have been instrumental to NITDA operations.
He described NITDA as a platform for Corps Members to develop themselves for greater opportunities while those that perform meritoriously during the service year would be retained.
“You need to promote yourself, hardwork doesn’t always get you to where you want to be. You need to be assertive to get what you want”.
“Some Corps Members have built solutions for us that we will be using internally. A Corps Member also challenged himself and built a solution that helped us to actualise our AI transformation plan”, Inuwa said.
