Transformation : NCC appoints Princess Oforitsenere Emiko to lead new DBI Governing Board - ITREALMS

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To realign Nigeria's digital talent pipeline, the Board of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has appointed Princess Oforitsenere Emiko as the Interim Chairman of the Governing Board of the Digital Bridge Institute (DBI), reports ITREALMS.

The high-level appointment anchors an aggressive blueprint by the Commission to reposition the institute to meet the demands of the next era of Nigeria's rapidly evolving communications sector and expanding digital economy.

DBI releases Nigeria Digital Economy Outlook 2026: Q1 Intelligence Report (Executive Edition) - ITREALMS

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DigitalSENSE Business Intelligence (DBI), an initiative of ITREALMS Media, has released the Nigeria Digital Economy Outlook 2026: Q1 Intelligence Report (Executive Edition), offering strategic insights into the trends, risks, and opportunities shaping Nigeria’s digital economy, reports ITREALMS.

The report provides a concise, data-driven overview of key developments across telecommunications, financial technology (fintech), digital infrastructure, policy, and investment dynamics. It highlights the increasing role of digital transformation in driving economic growth, financial inclusion, and innovation across the country.

DBI targets 2,000 primary, secondary school teachers by December - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

The Digital Bridge Institute (DBI) has declared focus on training over 2000 primary and secondary school teachers and administrators before year end, reports ITREALMS.

A press statement made available to ITREALMS, the Administrator of the Institute, Dr. Ike Adinde, stressed that the training programme is being extended to secondary schools under the initiative tagged Digital Awareness Programme (DAP) with funding provided by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).

ITREALMS recalls that DBI is the capacity-building arm of the NCC which has the mandate to train Nigerians on emerging trends and rudiments of Information Communication Technology (ICT). Adinde said the schools will cut across all the six geographical zones of the federation.

Adinde described ADAPTI as a shining example of what intervention from government can do. “The NCC has supported ADAPTI from its inception and so today the universities are enjoying our capacity building opportunities because there is funding coming from the NCC via the ADAPTI programme to the universities. As we speak ADAPTI has accounted for the training of over 50,000 Nigerian lecturers and non- lecturers across all tertiary institutions.

“This year we have extended the programme with the approval of the Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, Professor Umar Danbatta, to secondary schools, so we now have a second component of another version of ADAPTI which we call DAP (Digital Awareness Programme) which is an appreciation programme for secondary schools and this year we’re targeting over 2000 primary and secondary school teachers,” Adinde said.

The Administrator who is a strong advocate for increased funding for ICT training among African governments said capacity building should not be an option; “it is a choice that government and organisations just have to make because the more knowledgeable and more skilled your employees are, the better their performance and productivity at work, the better they’re able to contribute to organisational objectives and goals.”

The DAP programme targets pre-tertiary teachers and administrators of public schools for training in basic ICT, office productivity tools, Intranet and Internet, use of e-teaching and e-learning facilities at no cost to the participants to enable them with ICT skills to improve their learning, teaching and administration skills.

Chuks Egbune/ED. Ops

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DBI takes delivery of Huawei’s N100m ICT equipment - ITREALMS

ITREALMS:

Chinese Information and Communication Technology (ICT) company, Huawei Technologies, has donated N100 million ICT equipment to the Digital Bridge Institute (DBI) to boost capacity building, reports ITREALMS.

Speaking Wednesday in Abuja at a delivery ceremony, the Administrator of DBI, Dr. Ike Adinde noted the partnership with Huawei started in 2016 and that the equipment donated would help DBI reshape and redefine the institute’s capacity building process, especially in the area of telecommunications.

“This partnership will support a number of DBI training programmes and help build skills.

“Equipping this lab would have taken another three years to get there but coming together with a solution provider to build core competencies in a synergistic manner is a milestone.

On his part, Mr Uwazie Kingsley, Training Director of Huawei said the company’s training centre has been in existence since 2004 to meet the company’s career capacity building requirement.

Kingsley said that the partnership with DBI started in 2016 and amongst the plans we had was for DBI to utilize Huawei lab.

He said Huawei, however, believed that there was the need to go a step further, adding that DBI should be equipped to have a lab where trainings can take place.

“We believe DBI should be equipped to have a lab to carry out its training and this we are experiencing today.

“And the equipment made available would cover various training need in Information Communications Technology (ICT).

“We are looking at not just employed Nigerians but we are also looking at trainings that would benefit unemployed Nigerians that would get them ready to move into the ICT.

Further, the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that among the equipment donated by Huawei were core network, transmission and wireless equipment.

Uboshe Uboshe/GEE with additional reports from NAN.

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Invest more in ICT skills, DBI boss urges govts

ITREALMS:

The recently appointed administrator of the DigitalBridge Institute (DBI), Dr. Ikechukwu Adinde, has beckoned on government to invest more on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) skills, reports ITRealms.

DBI, ITRealms gathered prides itself as Nigeria’s foremost ICT capacity building institute, which is an arm of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).

Speaking at the weekend, Dr. Adinde, canvassed more investment by governments at all levels in the development of ICT knowledge and skill.

This, he said, is the only way the country will maximize its investments in ICT infrastructure. He disclosed this during a brief engagement with journalists in Abuja at the weekend. According to Adinde, without concomitant investment in skills and training, the nation cannot optimally harness the possibilities and potential inherent in the deployment of infrastructure across the country.

He said emphasis has been on funding of ICT hardware procurement, stressing that the time has come for a paradigm shift in which ICT funding should be spread across hardware, software and skills acquisition (training).

“There are two ways to funding ICT: infrastructure side and soft side (skills and knowledge). On the hard side which is the infrastructure side, it is easy to perceive the investment that is being made and often times that’s what the government talks about (buying computers, equipment, installing gadgets etc.), but the most important part is the skills and the knowledge that people need to harness the potential in those hardware investments.

“We had made a case sometime in 2016 at the capacity building symposium organised by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) that the investments in USPF (universal service provision fund) across Africa instead of being channeled wholly and exclusively to ICT infrastructure should be dedicated to ICT skills development, in that if someone is investing $10million in ICT infrastructure, 10 per cent of the money should go for ICT skills development especially targeted at the youths now commonly called the millennials.

“They are the ones who will use the infrastructure to innovate, create and develop the things that will make the future happen, but as long as we don’t make that investment then it means that you’ll put a piece of ICT equipment in an office and nobody is using it because the skills are not there”, he said.

He explained it using a telephone. “A typical phone, for example, can do a lot for us but because the knowledge of the use of the phone is not available, meanwhile we’ve invested a lot of money buying this device, we limit ourselves to just making calls and sending text messages”.

According to him, there’s a critical need to invest in building ICT capacity for the young people and that’s why “DBI continues to innovate programmes that target the young people so that we fulfil our mandate in that area”.

He explained that their training focuses on both young persons and those who are advanced in age but wish to upscale their ICT skills. “We have young people who have just finished from secondary school and are looking to pursue a career in ICT. They join our National Innovation Diploma programme, which is a two-year programme (Telecommunications Technology, Multimedia Technology, Networking and Systems Security and Computer Hardware and Software Engineering), after which they can move on or if they want to continue at a higher level they can pursue a degree in higher institutions.”

“We have people with degrees who come into the programme because the course is practical based, where the students are mostly in the lab. We have computer science graduates who are currently taking this programme (in Lagos and in Kano). The reason they’re in the programme is because they want to get hands-on experience from our labs and workshops. We also have professors, PhD holders and those in the public sectors with us; our programmes attract participants from across a wide range of the market,” he said.

Chuks Egbune/GEE

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Akwule decries lack of Africa’s contribution on Internet

Prof. Akwule, President,DBI

Echoes @ Nigeria IPV6 Roundtable 2012:

The President, Digital Bridge Institute (DBI), Prof. Raymond Akwule has decried the absence of significant Africa and Nigeria’s contributions in particular into the core Internet development.

Speaking at the 2012 edition of the Nigeria IPv6 Roundtable held in Lagos, Prof. Akwule who presided over the occasion, organized by DigitalSENSE Africa Media in collaboration with National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) and Internet Society (ISOC) Nigeria chapter, with the theme: IPv6 and the Future of Internet in Nigeria.

He said it has become worrisome there is absolutely no contribution from Nigeria on core internet evolution.

 “You will find out that there has been absolutely no contribution from our own country in this process,” he decried, wondering if this was because Nigeria and Africa at large lack the requisite people and capacity

“Is it because we don’t have people who understand language of the internet, architecture, engineering software?” he asked.

But, Prof. Akwule was quick to add that the above should not be the case, declaring “if we don’t have them in country, we have them in Diaspora.”

As the current president of Digital Bridge Institute, Prof. Akwule said unequivocally that Nigeria has what it takes to make relevant impact and contribute to the development of the Internet in some areas.

He, therefore urged experts to come up with how to improve on Nigeria and Africa’s contribution to Internet development, saying that this could start by crafting what happens in the core architecture of the internet such that Nigeria’s presence will be felt not just as users of the internet.

He enjoined Nigerians not to worry about studying a particular subject, pointing out that most bright Information Technology (IT) person he met so far in all institutions including the current one did not study IT.

“My best IT person that does all kinds of wonders did not study IT and I always say that because there is lesson there,” he submitted.

Remmy Nweke & Yinka Awasanya
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