Governments at all levels in Nigeria has been charged to declare a state of emergency on vocational technical education if the country must move away from relying on economically developed nations for its growth.
One way out of this dependence on other nations would be through the establishment of at least one vocational college in each local government area in the country.
This was the position of Prof Isaac Ogundu in his inaugural lecture titled “A Slave Does Not Trade in Plantain”, at Ignatius Ajuru University of Education, Rumuolumeni, near Port Harcourt on Thursday.
Ogundu explained that as a slave cannot make personal decisions on when to sell his wares but relies on the master, so is a nation that is economically dependent and cannot afford the basic needs for its citizens.
He said both were in slavery and needed liberation.
He also called for the amendment of the laws establishing the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (Tetfund) and the Industrial Training Fund (ITF) to accommodate funding for vocational technical education.
Ogundu, who is also the Dean of the Faculty of Vocational and Technical Education and head of the Ndele campus of the institution, posited that technology education provides the fundamentals that equip people with relevant skills needed to be economically independent.
He charged universities to interact within and with the industries, as well as join resources to solve societal problems, while urging universities to partner with industries to commercialise their result outcomes.
Ogundu called for the establishment of training centres where students on industrial attachment could acquire practical skills, while urging communities to contribute to the building and maintenance of vocational colleges.
He recommended a “synergistic quadruple helix framework” to facilitate interaction between the university, government, and society.
The Professor of Industrial Technical Education enumerated some of the challenges to vocational technical education as inadequate equipment, poor equipment management by the handlers, inadequate trained personnel, and poor electricity supply, among others.
Among some of the Professor’s contributions to scholarship are the fabrication of an integrated oil palm milling machine, a hydraulic press machine, and a fuel less generator.
In his remarks, the Acting Vice-Chancellor, Prof Okechuku Onuchuku , re-echoed the need for government to strengthen vocational colleges so that Nigerians who cannot afford university education could acquire relevant skills that would enable them to earn decent living, as well as provide for their families.
He noted that any nation that depends on another to feed its citizens was enslaved and cannot develop.
Onuchuku explained that when citizens possess sustainable vocational skills, they could engage in small scale enterprises that would enable them to provide for themselves and others.
The professor of econometrics, while noting that Nigeria has the resources to surpass its present economic status, regretted that the country was economically enslaved, as he reemphasised the need for interactions between the universities and the industry.
Onuchuku further asserted that acquiring relevant skills would empower the people to be self-dependent, and explained that his administration was determined to provide the students with entrepreneurship skills to make them employable or self-reliant.
The VC also disclosed his administration’s policy to allow all technical and vocational-related work in the institution to be executed by the faculty of vocational and technical education, explaining that doing so would expose the students to hands-on training.
He congratulated the inaugural lecturer for “a five-star inaugural lecture”, and assured the support of the Rivers State Government and corporate bodies to grow the university.
Earlier, the Acting Registrar, Mr Donald Okogbaa, described the lecture as the shortest but most incisive and applauded the inaugural lecturer for his brilliance and articulateness.
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