By Ifeoma Asika, Correspondent Campuses
Nigerian women have been charged to armour themselves and take up roles and responsibilities in the country’s Information and Communications Technology both in government and private sector.
The charge was coming from ICT experts, who spoke at the maiden edition of the Women Entrepreneurs & Executives in Tech Summit’ with the Theme: Future Tech Trends, Challenges and Opportunities for Women Entrepreneurs, also argued that women can only take up roles by participating in ICT skill training and retraining.
The Executive Vice Chairman/Chief Executive Officer(EVC/CEO) of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Prof. Umar Danbatta urged women to upskill themselves as it was critical to removing social and economic barriers.
“Women should be bold enough to take on entrepreneurship opportunities as well as a leadership position in other to play active roles in the evolving Digital Economy,” said Prof. Danbatta, who wasrepresented by Director, New Media and Information Security at NCC , Olatokunbo Oyeleye said.
He noted that for women to get the empowerment needed to compete favorably among their global peers, they must invest in digital skills, stressing that digital literacy improved family incomes, trade and created job opportunities for mothers. “Investing and supporting the younger generations digital development is critical, especially since females face disproportionate social impediment,” he added.
Also speaking at the Summit, the Google Nigeria Country Manager, Ms. Juliet Ehimuan, charged women to be inspired, think big and spot the opportunity, insisting that there should be no sympathy and sentiments but that women should create value for them to be recognized.
“The point is becoming an entrepreneur is all about problem-solving. Women should not go into entrepreneurship if they are not ready to solve societal challenges,” she argued.
While charging established women entrepreneurs to take up mentorship roles and mentor at least 10 other women entrepreneurs in order to build a pool of tech entrepreneurs in Nigeria, the Google Nigeria Boss urged women to show up and be known, stressing that was the only way they could contribute to policies that could grow and change society.
She gave examples of several women in Nigeria and indeed across the world who were leveraging ICT skills to build businesses that were in turn making a lot of money and ultimately, contributing to the economy of their homes and countries.
The ‘Women Entrepreneurs & Executives in Tech Summit, which was organized by TechLife Media and Communications Limited and powered by TechLife with Ugo, was well-attended by several stakeholders from both the government and the private sector.
The Summit, according to the organisers, was put together to brainstorm on the place of Nigerian women in the emerging world of technology and how they had fared in the recent time while expanding new ideas in ICT and Telecoms.
