The federal government has promised to establish a world-class innovation hub by the first quarter of 2024, to assist civil servants to showcase their innovative ideas and achieve their dreams.
The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Dr. Folasade Yemi-Esan, who made this known yesterday at the Award ceremony on the Third edition of the Federal Civil Service Innovation Challenge in Abuja, called on stakeholders to work with the civil servants to achieve their dream.
Yemi-Esan reiterated that the Nigerian Civil Service has very great potential for improvement, however, to unlock this potential, they must, first of all, recognise the cardinal role, innovation plays as a catalyst for positive change and development in any economy.
According to the head of the Civil Service of the Federation, as a critical driver of the country’s socioeconomic development, the civil service must rise to the expected function of providing effective leadership and policy frameworks.
“Most of the time we think that it is the private sector that should provide leadership, but that’s not true. It is the public sector that should lead, so that means that we are lagging, in our responsibility.
“The fulcrum of this edition of the federal civil service innovation competition is to bring innovative solutions to bear in addressing security challenges within the public space and develop new methods for advancing government business through public-private partnerships, as well as reducing the costs of governance.
“As you are already aware, the first-place winner will be awarded the price of a total song of N3,000,000. Well, the first and second runner-up winners will get N1,750,000 and N1,000,000 respectively. The other ten top performance will get N200,000 as a consolation prize,” she said.
She advised prospective participants at the competition that their drive to compete shall not be anchored on the prizes, rather, the motivation should be premised on the passion to help the service solve problems and to be more efficient and productive.
“This is a competition to encourage each other to bring out the best ideas. It shouldn’t become a competition where we begin to pull ourselves down and tear ourselves apart,” she said.
Earlier, the permanent secretary of, the Special Duties Office, in the office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Engr. Faruk Yusuf said that many developing countries, including Nigeria, have now realized the need for Innovation to provide customer-focused, cost-effective, and updated methods to improve public service performance.
He said that innovation in the public sector has become increasingly popular around the world as a strategy for improving governance and scaling up service quality.
“Realizing the importance of Innovation in enhancing Public Service delivery, the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (OHCSF) in line with the 2021–2025 Federal Civil Service Strategy and Implementation Plan (FCSSIP-2025) adopted Innovation as one of the six priority initiatives required to take the Nigerian Public Sector to greater heights.
“The goal is to develop an enduring culture within the Civil Service for improved service delivery via dedicated innovation units and innovation challenges. The goal of the competition is to provide an enabling environment for Federal Civil Servants to initiate, develop and deploy creative ideas to address existing and emerging challenges within Nigeria and beyond.
“The third edition of the competition commenced on the 19th of February this year and ends today with the selection of 3 winners out of 89 ideas initially presented to our panel of esteemed judges.
“The winning ideas have emerged and will be announced today, along with ten consolation prizes. All the ideas that were pitched are highly ingenious, providing solutions that were centered around advanced digital technologies,” he said.
