Nasarawa State Governor, Engineer Abdullahi Sule, has emphasized the critical role digital economy is playing in diversifying the economy of the country, stressing that last year’s contribution to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by digital economy was even higher than that of oil and gas.
Engineer Sule made this known while hosting a delegation from the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), led by its Director, E-Government Development and Regulations, Dr. Vincent Olatunji, at the Government House, on Thursday.
While congratulating President Muhammadu Buhari, for the initiative, as well as the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Ali Pantami and the Director-General NITDA, Inuwa Kashifu Abdullahi, for the good work they have been doing with NITDA, the Governor described the digtal economy as a huge going forward and improvement for Nigeria.
Speaking from his experience from the organized private sector, Engineer Sule said training on E-Governance will not only boost the Nasarawa Economic Development Strategy (NEDS), improve speed of doing business in government but most importantly, ensures accountability and transparency in governance.
He added that Nasarawa State has all it takes to benefit from the digital economy.
“We are at the centre, closer to the centre of attraction. We should benefit because we have all it takes,” the Governor said.
Engineer Sule however appealed to Nasarawa State citizens who will benefit from the training on E-Governance, to replicate the training by retraining others, as according to him, that’s the only way the state will benefit from the training.
Earlier, in his opening remarks, Director, E-Government Development and Regulations at NITDA, Dr. Vincent Olatunji, said even though the agency has been able to do a lot at the federal level on the national digital economy, more needs to be done across the states and local governments.
Olatunji added that they were in Nasarawa State on the directives of the NITDA director general, for the agency to look into the state government’s priority areas and see how ICT can be used to drive the priority areas, especially in E-Governance.
While commending the Governor for his inroads in ICT, the NITDA director said they were not surprised at the level of success so far recorded, considering the experience of the Governor as a major private sector player.
“That’s why it’s really good to have technocrats at the helm of affairs in Nigeria,” Olatunji said.
