The Centre for Management Development on Thursday sought collaboration with Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) to fulfill its mandate of providing capacity building for national development.
The Director-General/Chief Executive Officer, CMD, Mr Bitrus Chinoko, during a bilateral meeting with the representatives of JICA in Lagos, said that the centre needed support to achieve its goals.
Chinoko, who described the visit of JICA officials as home coming, said that the history of the CMD could not be written without JICA.
According to him, CMD’s area of focus has not changed.
He said that the center still wanted to build a viable entrepreneurship and business development department.
Seeking JICA’s cooperation in the training of Nigerian youths, the DG said: “A sizable number of our youth are roaming the streets because there are no jobs.
“We started a programme where we train the youth free of charge, and try to attach them to some industries so that they can learn skills. Unfortunately, we do not get a positive response but we have not given in.”
He said that the centre expected cooperation from JiCA in the area of leadership training, economic management, ICT and infrastructure development.
“Economies all over the world today are driven by knowledge. Of course, that is what Japan has stood out for. Everybody knows that what makes Japan what it is today is the knowledge-based economy that it runs.
“Except we have this knowledge impartation, we can have all the resources in the world in Nigeria, if it cannot be judiciously utilised and exploited for the good of everybody, nothing can be achieved.
“That is why we continued to emphasised on capacity building for national development and that is one of the key mandate for CMD, to provide capacity in the public sector and private sector.
“We cannot do this alone, the government itself is overwhelmed, and the need for technical collaboration with agency like JICA becomes very imperative,” he said.
The CMD boss expressed confidence that something positive would come out of the collaboration, saying whatever JICA would do CMD is done for the entire nation.
He said that that the staff needed capacity building with international best practices, that would be cascaded for national development across levels.
In his response, Mr Yuzurio Susumu, the Chief Representative of JICA in Nigeria said that the agency has been discussing with CMD for a long time about the future possible collaboration and cooperation.
“I heard there is a big headquarters office and facilities, so this time we are inspecting to see the facility on the ground and also if possible to observe the training they are running,” Susumu said.
He said that the agency was looking at collaborating in the area of training programmes in the priority area such as leadership, entrepreneurship, economic management and others.
Assessing the facility, Susumu noted that CMD was trying its best under the limited resources, saying “we understand that the government is facing some difficulties financially.
“I am very much encouraged that CMD is moving towards ICT here in training and retraining and libraries.”
On how soon the expected collaboration would commence, he said that the agency was still in discussion with his home country.
According to him, the agency will start bey supporting the CMD’s efforts in area of priority.
The CMD management took the JICA officials round its facilities during bilateral meeting that had some directors of the centre in attendance.
