FG to reposition Federal Training Centres in 6 geo-political zones – Perm. Sec.

The Federal Government has concluded arrangement to reposition all the Federal Training Centres (FTCs) in the six geo-political zones of the country, an official has said.

Mr Ndubuisi Osuji, Permanent Secretary, Service Policy and Strategy Office, Office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation (OHCSF), made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Saturday.

Osuji, who until recently was the Director for Learning and Development in the OHCSF, said all the FTCs are currently undergoing institutional study for repositioning.

He said that the mandate of all the centresmin Kaduna, Lagos, Ilorin, Maiduguri, Enugu and Calabar had changed from churning out secretaries and typists to producing data processors.

“The training centres are still very vibrant; right now the peer group is undertaking an institutional study of these training centres for the purpose of repositioning them.

“You have typists and secretaries who go there for conversion programmes on data processing; they also run programmes for verbatim reporters of the national and state house of assemblies.

“Some parastatals and para-military agencies also send their staff on courses there,” he explained.

The permanent secretary told NAN that their regular courses were accredited by the National Board for Technical Education (NBTE) and that the centres awarded diploma to their trainees in those courses.

According to him, the purpose of the centre is to enhance proficiency among the low and middle levels manpower in the civil and public services.

He disclosed that in 2017, more than 800 candidates were registered for various courses at the centres across the federation for the award of certificates and diplomas.

“As at last year, more than 800 candidates were admitted. What we did was to open it up, not restricting it only to civil servants.

“These centres also help all these parastatals in training and conducting promotion examinations,” he added.

The permanent secretary explained that paucity of funds at the centres, over the years had been responsible for the drop in enrollment of candidates to study relevant courses.

Osuji attributed the situation to dwindling resources from many ministries to sponsor their staff member for refresher courses at the centres.

He, however, said that the allocation for their running costs of the centres in particular was given directly from the office of the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF).

He also explained that the insurgency in the North-East had compelled the temporary relocation of the Maiduguri centre to Kaduna pending the return of normalcy.