On Saturday, 7^th August, CITAD held closing ceremony and presentation of certificates for its first training at Azare. The event which held at the premises of Sheikh Adam College of Arabic and Islamic Studies, Azare, marked the completion of a two-week Free Computer Training conducted by the organization. The training which commenced in July was attended by 36 participants, mostly teachers from the school, but included two staff of the Katagum Zonal Office of the Bauchi State Ministry of Education and four from the Accounts Department of the Katagum Local Government.

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The programme started at exactly 4:30pm, with opening prayers and recitation from the holy Qur’an by Mal. Auwal followed by introduction of the guests and the chairman’s opening remarks. In his remarks the chairman of the occasion Alh (Dr) Aminu Saleh CFR, GCON (Wamban Katagum) stated that; he persuaded CITAD Executive Director to come to Azare to give the training for the community to benefit from his knowledge and selfless effort of developing the people at the grass root level. He hoped that the beneficiaries would make proper use of the skills they acquired during the training. Wanbam Katagum also posited that as ICTs have became indispensable part of our lives, therefore, every individual inconsiderable of his status, class, area of operation should try as quick as possible to learn how to use ICTs at least, to his own personal usage.

The Guest Speaker was the Executive Director, CITAD who when took up the stage as started with telling the audience the reason behind the selection of teachers for the training saying that; if you give the training to teachers, it is as equally giving to the whole community, reason being that the teachers will impart the knowledge and skills to their students. He talked on the importance of ICTs to our daily endeavors and also questioned the various challenges facing Africa and Nigeria with respect to penetration and use of ICTS in particular, he said “Africans constitute 14% of the world population but as far as ICTs are concerned, Africa has only about 2%. He added that even within the African continent Nigeria is still far behind many countries such as South Africa, Senegal, Ghana, among other. Within the country, ICTs are concentrated largely in urban areas with three major cities accounting for about 60% of ICT related facilities in Nigeria.” He pleaded with youth and especially women to stand up and bridge the existing digital divide. He further thanks Wanbam Katagum for the support he has been given to the organization and promised that the organization will do all within its capacity to help the people of the area. When asked whether the organization will wait for government assistance and intervention for it to continue with the activities it has started, he said, “government is “motherboard” of all, therefore, her assistance was very important but when the government is not willing to assist, CITAD will not keep waiting, we will start the journey and let the government meet us on the way”

Commenting on behalf of the beneficiaries, Mal. Mu’azu Ibrahim, thanked the organization for not only training them but also sensitized them on ICTs. He said “ prior to this training there were people who we assumed were the most knowledgeable as far as computer is concern but with the coming of these facilitators from CITAD we came to know that these people have a lot to learn from that these consummate facilitators” he also pleaded with CITAD for the contribution of such programme.

High dignitaries at the occasion included Sarkin Azare, Alh. Waziri Mustapha, Alh Ibrahim Jarma (Jarman Katagum and former Comptroller General Nigerian Prison services), the Chief Medical Director, Federal Medical Centre Azare, represented by Mal Bakari Uba, The Zonal Director Katagum Zonal Education, The Dean School of Languages, COE Azare, KSA President, Malam Mustapha Chinade, Director, Legacy Computer, Kaduna and many others. The programme ended with closing prayers from Wanbam Katagum.

Earlier in the day, CITAD had conducted a sensitization lecture for students as part of its effort to ensure sensitization of all stakeholders on the use of ICTs for development. The lecture which was conducted at and for students and teachers of Islamic Orientation Secondary School, Azare, Katagum Local Government of Bauchi State started around 11:15am. After opening prayers, Mal. Isah Garba of Bauchi State CITAD Office made a précis of the significance of the programme, after which Mal. Abba Adamu, another CITAD volunteer in Bauchi State took-up the stage and talked extensively on the general concept of ICTs.

Mal. Ahmad A. Yakasai, of CITAD Head Office adopted a demonstrative method to explain the various computer components to the audience. Mal. Ahmad took a long time having interactive session with the audience to the extent that almost all the audience was not only carried along but also positively stimulated towards ICT.

CITAD Executive Director was the next after Mal. Ahmad. He also talked on the importance of ICT to the individuals and societies in general. He urged the audience to stand up and face these challenges so as to keep pace with the rapid growth of development and also benefit from the job opportunities provided by ICTs in the world today.

In his closing remarks, Mal. Muhammad Dankatagum Garba, the propitiator, Islamic Orientation schools, thanked the organization for the knowledgeable lecture, he further asserted that; “We have a piece of land, that we have been thinking of what to use it for, due to the inspiration we received from this lecture, I am please to tell this team that, we will dedicate that piece of land for the construction of our computer classes.” On the side of the students Mal. Dankatagum, said; ‘Prior to this lecture we have no computer lesson as a course of this school but In sha Allah now that we are inspired we will introduce the course.’