By Tony Obiechina, Abuja
The Federal Government is seeking the support of the Swedish Government to help drive its ongoing efforts of integrating technology and skills into the education sector.
The of Minister of Education, Prof Tahir Mamman who made the appeal while hosting the Ambassador of Sweden to Nigeria, Annika Hahn-Englung, on a working visit to the ministry on Tuesday in Abuja, said it was important to leverage Sweden’s technical expertise.
The Minister also said the Federal government is seeking the support of the Swedish government in the development of indigenous languages to aid sound educational development in Nigeria.
He said: “The presence of (Swedish) tech companies in education and training is very important for us because one of the major things this ministry is focusing on now is to bring technology and skills into our education system right from the very early stage of education and we feel it is a very important mechanism tool for learning and teaching.
“And so we will l be looking at your experiences to see how we can grow from that because what we want is right from primary school we want our students to be exposed to technology and skills so that at that stage they can grow with it and nurture critical thinking capabilities.
“Right now education is not all about just providing training people for jobs and skills of today, but preparing them to think about the skills of tomorrow and the best way to do that is by nurturing critical thinking capability right at the early stage.
“So we will be leveraging on your expertise and experience in that for us to develop our plans and integrate skills and technology into the curriculum at all the levels of our education system in Nigeria.”
Mamman who noted that some agreements had been signed between Nigeria and Sweden in the past, however, stressed the need for both countries to deepen bilateral relationships by committing to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in several areas of partnerships.
The Swedish envoy had earlier named some Swedish firms in Nigeria engaged in educational and entrepreneurship programmes.
Hahn – Englung who expressed Sweden’s readiness to deepen existing relationships, especially in the area of education, noted Sweden’s desire to have more students study in the country’s institutions of higher learning.
“We have quite a number of companies especially when it comes to EdTech but then also, we have ideas to see what we can do more together.
“We have many Nigerian students going to Sweden every year. They are very competitive students we have noticed but we will like to see that expand more.”
