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Technology has become strategic to taming insecurity and every country has embedded IT its blueprint of National Security, said Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Mallam Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi this week in Abuja while playing host to a delegation of military personnel from the Nigerian Army College of Environmental Science and Technology (NACEST) Makurdi.
The delegation was led by its Rector, Brigadier General Yahaya Abdulhamid.
NACEST operates as a polytechnic. The school offers diploma programmes in technical, vocational education and training. Like all polytechnics in the country, it is regulated by National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), the national body mandated to ensure the quality of all diploma programmes in Nigeria.
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With the advent of artificial intelligence, automated vehicles, drones and many other IT hi-tech innovations in fighting war, Abdullahi said technology has become paramount to not just winning wars but keeping a country safe.
“It is important to know how to use technology not just as an enabler but as a strategic design for your strategy in general which will inspire you to do more,” said Abdullahi.
“NITDA Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP 2021-2024) is built on seven pillars with their respective goals and objectives, which are; Developmental Regulations, Digital Literacy and Skills, Digital Transformation, Digital Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Cybersecurity, Emerging Technologies, and Promotion of Indigenous Content,” he added.
He said the agency is focused on improving how things are being done using technology and innovation by creating an enabling environment for tech and innovation ecosystem to flourish.
He assured NACEST of NITDA’s readiness for collaboration in the deployment of technologies to combat the country’s rising challenges of insecurity.
His words: “The National Centre for Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, a subsidiary of the agency is fostering the development of emerging technologies in preparing Nigeria for the Fourth Industrial Revolution in which NACEST can partner in research, development of technologies like drones, robotics, Artificial Intelligence, etc., as a veritable tool in combating national insecurity.”
According to the Rector of NACEST, the school leverages ICT across several of its curriculum including Computer Engineering laboratory, Computer Science Laboratory, E-Library, and Management Information System (MIS), among others.
His words: “We cannot have the best in what we are doing until we link our activities, operations and processes to Information and Communication Technology (ICT) which will provide us a path way towards achieving our goals and objectives, which everything we do technology drives in achieving it.”
“Nigerian Army College of Environmental Sciences and Technology is diverting from the theoretical process and focusing more on the practical aspects to enable us provide solutions to our problems.”
Provisioning of digital literacy for the IDPs
Meanwhile, NITDA also hosted the National Commission for Refugees, Migrants and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). The team was led by Federal Commissioner, Imaan Sulaiman-Ibrahim.
