Mr Andrew Abu, Chief Executive Officer, Young Innovators of Nigeria (YIN), has won the ‘Young ICT Advocate of the Year’ award.
The award was in recognition of his contributions towards the development of ICT innovation among young people in the last 10 years.
Abu received the award on Saturday night at the Fourth Nigeria Tech Innovation and Telecom Awards, organised by the Association of Telecom Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), in Abuja.
He was also recognised for his contributions to ICT development and applications and empowerment of youths with digital skills, thereby ensuring that they were gainfully employed.
Speaking on the sidelines of the event, Abu said that the award was an encouragement to the entire stakeholders in the IT and telecommunications industry.
According to him, the award is an indication that their impacts in the industry and the skills development drive being built across board are yielding results.
”We have provided advice to government on the kind of skills that young people need to be self-reliant and we have demonstrated that over the years as well by training lots of young Nigerians and engaging women in special programmes.
“This year makes it my 10th year of advocating and working towards the development of young Nigerians who are interested in taking up IT as a career,” he stated.
Abu also said that measures were being put in place to empower about 100 youths with IT skills and position them for better opportunities.
He said that the targets were youths who might have lost their jobs due to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the students affected by the ongoing Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike.
The award winner added that the training in software development and business consulting would be in partnership with the Central Soft Support Services Limited, a YIN-supported start-up.
