President Muhammadu Buhari has granted full scholarship up to the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree level to three secondary students who emerged winners at the year 2020 Young Nigerian Scientists Presidential Award competition.
The scholarship is in any science-related discipline of their choice at any university in the country.
Declaring open the 2020 Science, Technology, and Innovation Expo with the theme ”Enhancing the Growth of a Diversified Economy through Science and Technology”, the President in a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, commended the creativity and competitive spirit of the three young scientists who emerged tops in the competition tagged 774 Young Nigerian Scientists Presidential Award (774 YONSPA).
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The students are Akintade Abdullahi Akanbi of Osun State from Osogbo Government High School Osogbo, Osun State, who came first; while the second positions went to Uwakwe Nelson Kamsiyochukwu of Anambra State from British Spring College, Awka, and Aimofumhe Eshiobomhe Sigmus of FCT from the School of the Gifted, Gwagwalada, Abuja.
President Buhari noted that Nigeria’s greatest resource is its human capital, assuring that his administration would continue to support human resource development.
The President reiterated the commitment of the Federal Government to partner with the private sector on science, technology and innovation sector development towards ensuring that the sector plays the very important role in advancing the frontiers of knowledge for nation building.
The President, therefore, directed the Minister of Science and Technology to create the needed opportunities to ensure that Nigerian scientists work towards providing solutions to the nation’s challenges of insecurity, unemployment, poverty, healthcare delivery, power, among others.
The President affirmed that if Nigerian potentials in the science and technology sector are properly harnessed, with the enabling environment created, 100 million Nigerians would be taken out of poverty in the next 10 years.
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In his remarks, the Minister of Science and Technology, Ogbonnaya Onu, thanked President Buhari for the many efforts in promoting science, technology and innovation, including recognizing the sector as being at the centre of all economic activities under the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) 2017-2020.
The Minister said in the last six months of the second term of President Buhari, the science, technology and innovation sector helped create over 900,000 jobs while data from the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, showed that Nigeria saved over N1 trillion in the importation of raw materials in both 2017 and 2018.
As the COVID-19 crisis spreads across the globe, Onu declared that what is happening around the world is a wake-up call to intensify efforts to manufacture goods locally and patronize made-in-Nigeria products.
