In Nigeria, the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is planning to deploy ICT centers in all state secretariats. The information was announced by the Agency’s Managing Director Kashifu Abdullahi, in response to Shu’aibu Ibrahim, head of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), who asked NITDA to replicate the ICT center it established at the Federal Capital Territory Secretariat in other state secretariats.

According to Shu’aibu Ibrahim, such collaboration with NITDA will help the NYSC build digital skills of its members. “What most Corp members have is the knowledge and we need to help them in transforming the knowledge to skills so it can be beneficial to them and make them self-reliant. NYSC is a gateway organization that can be used to harness the potential of the youths in the country, which will aid the nation in its drive to transform the economy to a digital one,” Kashifu Abdullahi said. According to him, in addition to building capacities, the new facilities will provide corp members with tools to ‘overcome some of the challenges they are facing, especially on checkmating the spread of fake news on social media.”

“Social media abuse is a burning issue that disturbs everyone; we have to work with other government agencies to collaborate on solving the issue. There is the need to regulate it and people should be held responsible for whatever content they post,” the NITDA MD said.