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occasion
Friday, 14 October, 2016
Honour for High Chief Gbadamosi By Bayo Alade
I
T was a gathering of international crème-de-la crème when High Chief Ambaliu Adewoga Gbadamosi, Baba Adinni and Balogun of Ilisan Remo in Ikenne Local Government of Ogun State, was recently honoured with awards. He received two awards in his home town (Ilisan), thus negating the saying that a Prophet is not honoured in his hometown. For High Chief Gbadamosi, the reverse is the case, as the Ilisan Youth Movement Association, and an age group called Majority Age Group, honoured him in a ceremony characterised by pomp and pageantry. The Chairman, Ilisan Youth Movement Association, Oyeledun Oladele Adebisi, said the association consists of youth clubs and age grades, stating that in the last three years, prominent indigenes who had contributed towards the development of Ilisan Remo had been honoured.
In his speech, Adebisi added that the criteria for giving the award is personal contribution to youth empowerment, and to the community as a whole. The awardee must also be a well-accepted personality in the community in order to be selected for the award. This year, he said, “the awardee is a man of the people, lover of youths; here is a man who single-handedly donated a Doctors’ Quarters, a block of two-bedroom flats, tastefully furnished with modern facilities to Ilisan Community Hospital.” Not only that, the awardee established two companies which employ no fewer than a 100 staff. Ambaliu Gbadamosi, popularly known as King of boys, is said to have donated the Doctors’ Quarters to provide a conducive environment for resident doctors so that they could easily be available to their patients at anytime.
The awardee, High Chief Ambaliu Gbadamosi (fourth right) and others who came to celebrate with him.
High Chief and Chief (Mrs) Ambaliu Gbadamosi.
Chief Gbadamosi with well-wishers.
Chief Gbadamosi with Kunle Otemolu, Chairman IYM, Oyeledun Adebisi and another guest at the occasion.
Stakeholders propose ICT solutions for Nigeria’s security challenges By Rita Okonoboh THE 10th International Conference on ICT Applications, which was a three-day event which held from Tuesday, October 4th till Thursday, October 6th, was a gathering of information technology experts at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, for the AICTTRA 2016 conference. With the theme, “Towards National Security and Development – The ICT Perspective,” the conference, which held at the Centre of Excellence in Software Engineering, OAU, Ile-Ife, featured experts and delegates from across the country, who had plenary discussions on security challenges and ICT as the solution and tool for national development. Speaking on the achievements of Application of ICT to Teaching, Research and Administration (AICCTRA), the General Chair, AICTTRA, Dr Ayodeji Oluwatope, stated that the organisation, in the past ten years, had been able to establish the conference within and outside Nigeria to bring to bear the interaction between the academia and the industry. “We have been able to establish the fact that we can encourage and motivate colleagues to showcase their research output in the area of ICT in the last 10 years. We picked the theme because security is a major issue in the country at the moment, in terms of physical, health, job security, food security, among others. So, we want to look at the aspect of using ICT to address security challenges and to engender national development,” Oluwatope stated. The keynote speaker, the Director, Information Technology and Media Services, University of Ibadan, Oyo State, Dr Oluwaseyitanfunmi Osunade, in his view on how ICT has reshaped Nigeria, noted that “the first thing is to get knowledge and that has been consistent with AICTTRA over the past 10 years, which is quite commendable. They have been able to focus on application within the teaching and learning environment where most academics are. To rate technology in Nigeria, I would say we are still at 40 per cent, which, for me, is still a good thing, in spite of the challenges. For example epileptic electricity supply is a major challenge and there are no digital laws that tackle cybercrime. Also, we don’t take electronic evidence in
Participants at the event.
court. These are things affecting the development of ICT but with time, these things will change.” On his take on how government can use ICT to tackle security challenges, Dr Osunade recommended “unique identification for each person. For instance, in other countries, when you want to open a bank account, all you need is a government-issued identity card. In Nigeria, it’s a different ball game. However, once you’re able to uniquely identify a person, it is easy to trace criminals and that will solve a lot of problems as regards security challenges.” Addressing the issue of Nigeria’s ranking in cybercrime, Dr Oluwatope recommended “education and advocacy right from primary school all through to tertiary level, not forgetting the semi literate because they are also catching up with ICT and it is not impossible that they also contribute to Nigeria’s cybercrime rating. There is a need to enlighten, advocate and educate on the proper use of ICT in Nigeria. Technology in Nigeria, from the point of view of Information Technology, is making waves because Nigerians are finding it much easier to express themselves in ICT, compared to other aspects of technology. ICT contributed effectively to the national Gross Domestic Growth in the past two years. That is quite encouraging,
although there’s a lot more to be done.” The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Classic Systems Infotech Limited, Mr Solomon Akporkpokpor, highlighted some achievements of ICT over the years to include human capital development through training in various areas to prepare people for leadership positions in ICT industries across the country and boosting entrepreneurship skills among Nigerians. In his recommendations for cybercrime, Akporkpokpor called for “moral value retraining, that is, teaching people the value of hard work. People, these days, are in a hurry. Everything in life is a process and young Nigerians should understand this and the fact that it takes time to build skills and gather experience before money starts coming in. Also, we should develop capacity in network security – that is, not leave our network porous. People need to be aware of certain security tips while on the internet to prevent cybercrime; these security tips include: using strong passwords; changing passwords from time to time; protecting financial information, among other precautions. It is insensitive to hand over ATM cards to friends to make withdrawals on your behalf. You may trust your friend, but don’t forget that your friend has other friends.”