The Republic of Gambia has commended Nigeria’s support in its educational system through the Nigerian Technical Aid Corps (NTAC) scheme.
The Gambian Minister of Higher Education, Research, Science and Technology, Professor Pierre Gomez, made the commendation in Abuja, during a visit to the Nigerian Technical Aid Corps.
The Minister said, Gambian President Adam Barrow, expressed his pleasure with the timely intervention of some Engineering Professors deployed to Gambia through the Nigerian Technical Aid Corps who are running the University of Applied Science, Engineering and Technology (USET) of Gambia.
According to the Minister, the President reiterated that Nigerian Professors have changed the narrative in the country’s higher education for their skills, innovation and enterprise development, such enrollment at the USET has increased from 47 to over 200 in the last academic session commending the TAC Volunteers currently serving in Gambia,
Professor Gomez noted that the Engineering Professors were championing a new wave of innovations aimed at fashioning out self-funding initiatives for Universities that had hitherto depended solely on the government’s subvention.
“Today we are here again to request the help of our big brother, Nigeria. This is because your Volunteers have performed greatly well in our country. The great dynamism they have brought into our country’s higher education is changing narratives everywhere and we cannot but request for more hands to mentor our teachers and administrators to get things right. You gave us all we needed before. The Engineering Professors you gave to our country are more than anyone can ever expect in terms of their productivity and results on the ground.”
“But here we are again, we are begging your professionals to come and mentor our people in the area of Education, a different area from what the Engineers are already doing,” the Minister stated
In his remarks the Director General of the Nigerian Technical Aid Corps, Buba Yakubu, assured the people of the Gambia of the Nigerian continuous support in the area of her educational needs, explaining that, “the whole idea of NTAC is to fill such gaps among brother nations in the African Caribbean and Pacific countries.”
The DG congratulated the Government and people of Gambia on the vital roles which Professor Gomez has continued to play in making the higher education sector of the country better, adding that “the new University of Education would aid in no small way in producing the needed crop of teachers that would deepen education and research in the West African nation.”
The DG pledged to facilitate the process of offering the requested assistance to Gambia in the weeks ahead, stressing that “the impact of today’s decision on the country ‘s teaching and learning needs would reverberate positively in the educational sector in the next twenty years.”
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