FG, Google to collaborate in tackling ‘out of school children’ challenge

• P&G to open new multi-million dollar plant in Nigeria

The Federal Government will support any partnership that addresses literacy and educational challenges including the problem of out of school children and girl child education in Nigeria, according to Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, SAN.

Prof. Osinbajo stated this on Thursday when he received on a courtesy visit to the Presidential Villa, a delegation from Google Global Services in the United States.

According to him, “it might help if we begin to look at something more in the area of literacy type skills because really, we are looking at how to expand the whole scope of education especially education for girls.

“So, the question really is how we can use technology to make it easier for girls, in particular, to go to school, because if we somehow bring education to their doorsteps, it might take care of some of the problems around taking them out of their home environment.

According to the Vice President, “for us, our education mandate is so crucial.”

Explaining how the Federal Government is partnering with different stakeholders, Prof. Osinbajo said “It is an interesting partnership – business, government and civil society working together. We are already looking forward to a lot of the great work that will be done.”

“All of that fits into our education agenda which partly aims at addressing the out of school children and the girl child education issues.”

Speaking on behalf of the Google delegation, Mr Doron Avni, the firm’s Government Affairs and Public Policy Director described Prof. Osinbajo as an excellent partner whose support had enabled the organization record remarkable success in Nigeria.

According to him, “Obviously, we have an excellent partner here who has been doing God’s work, it is thanks to leading partners like him that we are able to be helpful in communities in which we operate.

“We had made a pledge to train 10 million people in Africa by 2022, I am happy to report to you that so far we have trained more than 5 million people.  Most important is the fact that out of those 5 million, 3 million are Nigerians.

“With the collaboration that we have with the Ministry of Education, we have now integrated some of Google’s curriculum on online safety into the school’s curriculum. So, we will be reaching 56 million students in Nigeria this year.”

He then added that the company’s target of training up to 10 million people in Africa by 2022 was realizable.

Earlier in the day, Osinbajo while speaking to a delegation from Procter & Gamble led by its President for Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa, Mr Suran Magesvaran, said the initiatives of the Buhari administration in the past four years would boost local industries and make them more competitive on the African continent.

The Vice President said “We are concerned about making sure that our industries are competitive by fixing power and other infrastructure. We are looking at port operations, trying to connect the port to the Lagos-Kano rail line.”

On his part, Mr Magesvaran announced the company’s plans to set up a new multi-million dollar plant in Nigeria as part of its new investments in Africa.