The Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Pantami, has advised the Nigerian youth to develop their creative and entrepreneurial skills, especially as it relates to the ICT sector.

According to the News Agency of Nigeria sources, Pantami made the call at the closing ceremony of  the Hackathon Actinspace Competition organised by NIGCOMSAT Limited in Abuja.

What they are saying

Commenting on the imperativeness of the digital skills, the minister who was represented by the Managing Director, Galaxy Blackbone, Prof. Mohammed Abubakar said: “It gives us great opportunity to become major participants in the growing global digital economy, thereby making ICT not just an enabler but a catalyst for economic growth.”

The honorable minister also revealed that the competition was targeted towards enhancing the creativity and entrepreneurial skills of the participants. In lieu of this, the minister urged the youth to develop specialized skills in order to empower themselves, saying it would enable them to build a workforce and establishing startups for the communication industry.

He advised the six teams and 25 participants to work hard as they have demonstrated capabilities in different projects.

In a similar vein, the Managing Director of NIGCOMSAT, Dr. Abimbola Alale, stated that the competition made the participants be more creative, noting that digital skills are the bedrock of a nation’s digital economy. She concluded by asserting that there was a need to expand and domesticate the satellite ecosystem in Nigeria.

What you should know

Actinspance is an international competition targeted at students of tertiary institutions, IT startups, and entrepreneurs to utilize space technologies to create solutions that improve everyday life.

This year’s edition was won by Team Astromania from Kaduna state and they would represent the country in France next year at a global contest.