BY FESTUS OKOROMADU
The Federal Government said plans are on top gear between the UN World Tourism Organization and some private sector players to establish a Tourism Academy in Lagos.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, disclosed this on Friday in Lagos at the graduation of first set of trainees of the Terra Kulture-owned Terra Academy For the Arts.
He said the Academy will provide accessible vocational and managerial transformative training for the tourism and hospitality sector.
The UNWTO also plans to work with Nollywood to positively change Africa’s image, the Minister stated.
A statement issued by Segun Adeyemi, Special Assistant to the President (Media) Office of the Minister of Information and Culture, quoted the Minister as saying, “We are very keen to expand the opportunities available to our youths through training.
“I am therefore happy to announce that we are currently working with the UNWTO and some private sector players to establish a Tourism Academy in Nigeria. This initiative was launched and approved during the global conference on Tourism, Culture and the Creative Industry held in Lagos last November.
“In recognition of our country’s giant strides in the Creative Industry, Nigeria was chosen as one of the two countries in Africa to host the Academy.”
The Tourism Academy will be complemented by organizations such as TAFTA to train Nigerian youths on how to be gainfully employed through their creative abilities, the Minister said.
“With TAFTA targeting 65,000 youths between the ages of 16 and 35 for training in the next five years, I can say without equivocation that TAFTA is contributing its own quota – and it’s a huge quota – to efforts to solve the youth unemployment problem in Nigeria,” he said.
The Minister poured encomium on the founder of TAFTA, Mrs. Bolanle Austen-Peters, stressing that she has excelled in the Performing Arts and in movies and was involved in discovering, nurturing, exposing and projecting talent from Nigeria through Terra Kulture since 2003.
He expressed delight that Mrs. Austen-Peters has now deemed it fit to establish TAFTA, an online academy set up to create a platform for indigent youths to learn technical skills in the areas of light design, sound design, animation and script writing, among others.
Mohammed expressed delight that Mrs. Austen-Peters, who is the Provost of TAFTA and the Founder of Terra Kulture, has decided to extend her attainment of excellence in the performing arts and movie production to the training of youths to prepare them for gainful employment.
“Who can ever forget ‘Saro the Musical’, the premiere of which I watched live in London; ‘Wakaa’ or ‘The Kalakuta Queens’, also musicals, just to name a few? I recall that ‘The Kalakuta Queens’ was performed for a global audience when Nigeria hosted the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) Commission for Africa meeting in Abuja in 2018. Those who watched that performance were so dazzled that they have continued to talk about it to this day,” he said.
The Minister pledged the partnership of the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture with TAFTA to extend the invaluable training of youths in the creative sector across the length and breadth of Nigeria, adding that when vacancies are available, TAFTA graduates can be recruited by some of the parastatals under the ministry, while the Academy can also help train some of staffers of the ministry, especially the great talents in the National Troupe of Nigeria.
He congratulated TAFTA for the successful graduation of the first set 3,750 trainees, and admonished the trainees to take advantage of the opportunity offered to them by TAFTA.
Vandalism bane behind poor quality service by telcos – NCC
he Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) says vandalisation of telecommunications infrastructure is affecting quality service delivery on digital platforms.
The Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC) has attributed the poor quality service delivery of digital platforms operating in country to vandalism of telecommunications infrastructure.
Executive Vice-chairman, NCC, Umar Danbatta, disclosed this while speaking at the ‘Youth, Civil Society, and Stakeholder Summit on Curbing the Destruction and Vandalisation of Telecom and Other Critical National Infrastructure in Nigeria During the Elections’, held in Abuja on Thursday.
Represented by Chukwuma Nwauwu, NCC’s head, wireless network, said the commission remains committed to improving service delivery by protecting the digital space.
He added that the NCC is also working with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to ensure a smooth conduct of the elections.
“We received reports of vandalisation of telecom infrastructure from the operating from telecom companies and these acts impact on the delivered quality of services and the availability of the digital platforms.
“Some of the impacts are as follows: Disruption of the network services and disconnection of digital platforms, congestion of alternative backup routes/networks, interruption of social and economy activities, loss of revenue, ripple effect on other networks and networkelements, delay in network recovery.
“The forthcoming elections, national activities and programmes, communication with friends and families, conducting banking activities especially use of point of sales (PoS) machines, all depend on the national telecom infrastructure.
“We all need to protect and preserve these infrastructure, as it will impact severely many aspects of our daily lives and activities in the event of its disruptions.
“The general election is only a few days from today and technology as you are all aware will play a crucial and key role in delivering free and fair elections to Nigerians.
“The NCC is, therefore, working very hard and collaborating with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to ensure that election results are transmitted electronically as required by law.
“We all have a duty to protect the national telecom infrastructures as such to benefit from the dividends of democracy and good governance.”
Dambatta added that the growth in the digital economy proved the NCC’s commitment to improving telecom services and infrastructure.
According to the professor, telecom subscriptions grew from 206 million active lines in June 2022, to 222 million in December 2022.
He said the NCC and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) are collaborating to protect telecom infrastructure as a critical national asset.
