TheCable

Speaking at a press conference in Abuja on Friday, Dominic Udoatan, president of the association, said the current curriculum of technical colleges in the country is weak and inadequate to address current trends of technological development.

He said the government needs to encourage the technical schools with adequate funding and equipment for meaningful development, such as industrialisation to take place in the country.

“Government should have a compelling motivation for enhancing development through adoption and stimulation of appropriate technology,” Udoatan said.

“Government support and funding will contribute substantially to the development of high technology products, particularly, in our present-day Nigeria.”

Uduoatan added that the federal government should establish skills acquisition centres for the training and retraining of young Nigerians which he noted is a prerequisite for the development of local technology.

“In this area, NATE is willing to partner with the federal government to pilot the implementation of the programme as we the graduates of polytechnics are both theoretically and practically oriented,” he added.

The NATE president also said it is important that the government review primary school curriculum to reflect more creative content to catch the pupils young in the areas of skills and technology acquisition.

Speaking on the disparity between the higher national diploma (HND) and bachelor of science (BSc) in the civil service, he appealed to President Bola Tinubu to use his office to abolish the discrimination between holders of the two certificates.

He added that the president should direct the head of the service of the federation to develop  a career progression in the service scheme that will allow HND graduates to progress beyond grade level 14 (GL14-17)