THE Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA, Mallam Kashifu Abdullahi Inuwa, has won the 2022 ‘Foreign Investment Network (FIN)-Forbes Outstanding Corporate Governance CEO’.
Kashifu Inuwa was announced as the winner at a virtual award ceremony on Friday, just as NITDA concluded trainings of over 100 journalists on digital journalism and fact-checking.
Dalith Steiger, a Global AI Strategist and Innovator, read the citation on Kashifu.
Steiger who is also AI Thought Leader and Advisor Fortune 500 enterprises & governments said Kashifu Inuwa is a versatile IT professional, strategist and transformation manager with experience spanning the private and public sectors in IT operations, has applied himself and excelled in several positions with proven capacity in the past 16 years.
“A graduate of Computer Science from Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi, Kashifu is a thoroughbred IT professional and the first Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE) in Nigeria’s public sector.
“He is also a Massachusetts Institute of Technology – MIT Sloan – trained strategist and has participated in various Leadership and Management courses in Harvard University, Cambridge University, and IMD Business School, Switzerland, among others.
“Following professional stints at Galaxy Backbone Limited, the Central Bank of Nigeria, and sterling performance as the Technical Assistant to the then DG, President Muhammadu Buhari appointed Kashifu as DG of NITDA in August 2019,” Steiger added.
While appreciating FIN and Forbes for their award, an elated Kashifu Inuwa said: “At NITDA, we have worked tirelessly to ensure that we adhere to the highest standards of corporate governance.
“We have implemented robust processes and systems to ensure that our operations are transparent, accountable, and in line with our mission and core values.”
Meanwhile, the President of Nigeria Union of Journalist (NUJ), Mr Chris Isiguzo, has commended NITDA for commencing the New Year with the training of over 100 journalists in January 2023 alone.
Speaking at the end of Digital Journalism Workshop and Fact-checking in Port-Harcourt, facilitated by Image Merchants Promotion Ltd (IMPR), Publishers of PRNigeria and Economic Confidential, the NUJ boss observed that the media industry is facing major challenges due to emerging technology.
He said: “It is painful to observe that some journalists lack adequate knowledge on modern digital tools for media coverage and reportage while others excessively rely on unreliable and fake media platforms as sources of information.
“Similarly, the dearth of investigative journalism is also obvious where social media influencers claiming to be journalists become armchair reporters and critics by relying on hearsay on the internet to propagate fake news and hate speech.
“We are therefore glad that NITDA is organising workshops on digital journalism and Fact-Checking that would go a long way in enhancing the capacity of the journalists to professionally engage and deploy modern tools by broadening their skills in reporting and editing with the right knowledge of ICT.”
The training programme was held in Lagos, Enugu and Rivers. In 2022, a similar programme was held for journalists in Abuja, Kano, Kwara, Jigawa, and Kebbi States, among others.