By Philip Yatai

The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) says it is repositioning its workforce in line with global trend through digitisation of governance and service delivery.

Dr Jummai Ahmadu, acting Director, Reform Coordination and Service Improvement Department, FCTA, stated this in Abuja on Thursday during a one-day Innovation Expo and Workshop, organised by the FCTA.

Ahmadu said that the goal was to make service processes in the FCTA easier and leave no one behind in the technologically driven world.

“To this end, we sent out a call circular for management approval for staff to come up with innovative ideas on how we can carry out our functions effectively and efficiently in a very cost-effective manner.

“The entries are here this morning, and we are here to analyse what the staff have done.

“The evaluation team will take a few days to go through the entries and fish out those that are workable for the FCT Administration to adopt at a minimal cost but have efficient and effective outcomes.

“The Innovation Expo was, therefore, organised to evaluate the entries from the staff who are the drivers of innovations,” she said.

Mr Austin Okafor, Director of Information and Communication Technology (ICT), FCTA, said that the administration was building the ICT infrastructure from the ground up.

Okafor said that FCTA was currently building internet connectivity to connect all Secretariats, Departments and Agencies (SDAs) in collaboration with Galaxy Backbone with a base in Area II, Garki, Abuja.

“This is to make sure that every department is connected. That is the baseline technology we want to bring. After that, we will roll out the digitisation programme such that every SDA will be connected.

“Right now, we are moving with paper, files, and documents, but by the time we finish, we will move from that level to paperless.

“We are training our staff on basic ICT skills and so far, more than 3,000 staff have been training and it is going to be a continuous exercise.

The director said that the FCTA would go paperless by December 2025, and advised any staff that is not ICT compliant to either shape in or you shape out.

On his part, the acting Director, Human Resource Management, FCTA, Mr Akinkunmi Ogunniran, assured that the administration was working to ensure that those managing the federal capital were ICT ready.

Ogunniran added that FCTA was doing so much to ensure that all the platforms and resources that would be needed for the new culture of ICT were put in place.

“The city management, infrastructure, and development processes are all going to be automated and we are getting set for it and those who felt they have nothing to do with ICT will fall by the wayside,” he said.

Mr Chris Ojenmu, Assistant Director, Administration, Abuja Metropolitan Management Council, who submitted an entry, described the initiative as “very apt” in solving a lot of problems in the FCT.

Ojenmu explained that his entry was on how the FCTA could deploy smart streetlight to address lots of challenges affecting the city,

“Take for instance, the one chance problem, darkness at night and the issue of stolen manhole cover, gully inlet cover and several other issues.

“When there is an accident, it takes a long time to evacuate the vehicle or to even know the location where the accident happened or a report to get to the person in charge to solve the problem.

“My innovation is to put a smart streetlight in our streets. Right now, we have street lights, but they only provide light at night; they don’t do anything more than light.

“But we can put a smart streetlight that will have a sensor, a camera, a loudspeaker, an alarm system, and a reporting system,” he said.

He said that if installed, the streetlight would report and sound an alarm when someone is stealing a manhole cover and help facilitate the arrest of the operator by providing visual data.

He added that the smart device would also monitor flood and redirect traffic and provide GPS position to direct emergency officials to an accident scene.

“The smart streetlight can solve virtually all the problems of the city and generate revenue for FCT because many businesses will cash in on the innovation,” he added.

Also, Mr Abor Abor, Head of Operational Safety and Health, said his entry was on innovative concept on how to move operational safety and health delivery in the FCT.

Abor explained that operational safety and health deals had the identification, prevention, and control of injury related diseases in the workplaces.

“Workplaces are springing up in the FCT daily, leading to high incidence of operational accidents, incidents, deaths, and disabilities.

“So, I came up with a concept which if well implemented, will go a long way in not only improving service delivery but also increase revenues for the government,” he said. (NAN)

Edited by Idris Abdulrahman