The director-general of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Mallam Kashifu Abdullahi, has said Nigeria can earn more revenue through the digitisation of her economic activities.
Speaking during a one-day stakeholders’ engagement forum themed “Creating Opportunities, Breaking Boundaries: Towards Digitisation and Entrepreneurial Evolution” in Kaduna, he said the country is realising her goal of a digital economy and will generate more revenue from information and communication technology (ICT) than [it does from] crude oil.
According to him, the engagement programme which brought technology solution experts, business owners, non-governmental organizations, academics and others together aims to create an understanding between the agency and its stakeholders in pursuit of the digitisation and entrepreneurial evolution of Nigeria.
Represented by the agency’s director of zonal offices directorate, Babajide Ajayi, Abdullahi said the meeting with the stakeholders which cut across the public and private sectors, the hubs and every sector of the country was organised as part of efforts to realise the agency’s goal.
“We are engaging the vast stakeholders because we want to get to the level of the advanced countries, where we can generate more revenue from tapping into ICT than crude oil.
“We are in the process of realising our dream of a booming digital economy. You will notice that our ministry, formerly known as ‘communications’ was changed to ‘communications and digital economy’; not just for the sake of it but to ensure that we achieve all forms of digitisation in this country.
“In addition to that, our policy document, Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan (SRAP) 2021-2024, will serve as the guide for the agency towards the realisation of Nigeria’s vision to digitisation,” he said.
The NITDA boss added that the agency deemed it necessary to collaborate more with its stakeholders, to ensure that developmental strides at the national level come down to the state and local government levels.
“In addition to that, we also need to hear from them where we are doing well and where they think we are not doing well enough. We have had similar engagements in Gombe, Bauchi, Lagos, Ogun and Kano. Also, we are getting a good response because there are things, we didn’t even know about that are being revealed and we are taking this feedback back to Abuja to map out how we can have a better working relationship with the stakeholders,” he stated.
Also speaking, the head of the northwest zonal office of NITDA, Alhaji Sheikh Abubakar Lawan said the agency is putting measures in place to address fraudulent activities associated with information technology which has been the fear of many stakeholders.
Some of the stakeholders who spoke at the event called for a closer working relationship between the agency and stakeholders in public and private sectors towards ensuring speedy actualisation of NITDA’s mandate.
