BY DAVIDSON ADAM
The Minister of Science and Technology, Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, has canvassed for the deployment of Science, Technology and Innovation (STI), to help Nigeria overcome the present insecurity bedeviling the country.
Onu said this during a working visit by the Senior Executive Course (43) of the National Institute for Policy and Strategic studies (NIPSS), in his office on Tuesday.
According to Dr. Onu, the use of STI will enhance intelligence gathering and facilitate the use of cutting-edge technology to eliminate security challenges in all regions of the country.
The Minister stressed the need for Nigeria and other developing countries to develop home-grown solutions to challenges facing them, such as production of vaccines to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic.
He said: “No matter how wealthy and rich a nation can be, in terms of resources, there is need to make sure that many of the things needed in your country are locally provided.”
He said that Nigeria has the capacity to confront all the challenges facing it, adding that all goods and services being imported can be locally produced.
According to him, federal government is at the implementation stage of the revolutionary Executive Order 5, which seeks to place Nigerian professionals and deployment of Technology as the fulcrum of socio-economic activities, adding that the federal government is focused on lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty by the turn of the decade.
Earlier, the Director of research at the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Prof. Dung Pam Sha, said that the Institute will work closely with the ministry to ensure the deployment of STI in solving national challenges at all levels.
He also said that the Institute is on a fact-finding mission, on the contributions of the Ministry to national development which will enable the institute make necessary recommendations to the Presidency on how to improve the role of STI to national development.