NCS Decries Low Adoption of Information Technology in Nigeria, Calls for Reforms

The Nigeria Computer Society (NCS), the umbrella body for all Information Technology (IT) professionals in Nigeria, has raised the concern about low adoption of IT in Nigeria, especially in the government circle, and has called for reforms.

President of NCS, Prof. Adesina Sodiya, raised the concern, while addressing members of the National Executive Council of NCS and the media, at the second quarter press conference of NCS, which held as a hybrid conference in Abuja recently.

According to Sodiya, the low adoption of IT in Nigeria is setting the country backward in an era where the practice of digital technology is driving global development.

Sodiya therefore called for immediate reforms of all the activities of IT professionals in government establishments.

He explained that NCS has proposed to government, through the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, for the establishment of a medium IT cadre for IT professionals working in government and that the proposal has been approved by the Council of Communications and Digital Economy and transmitted to the Head of Service of the Federation for further consideration and approval.

“This cadre of IT professionals will be encouraged to drive IT adoption in government, once it is approved and established. NCS is therefore calling on the federal government to speed up the approval process in order to drive IT adoption in government,” Sodiya said.

He decried a situation where some of the activities of government like file processing, are still manually processed in today’s digital era, where computing is fast developing.