The Director-General of the Edo State-owned John Odigie Oyegun Public Service Academy (JOOPSA), Precious Imuwahen Ajoonu, stated on Tuesday that civil servants in the state were the core staff of the academy, which began operations a year ago.
Ajoonu, speaking at the JOOPSA Open House program organized by the institute, emphasised that civil servants’ roles in the academy’s success debunked the erroneous belief that civil servants are not productive.
She stressed that contrary to such wrong profiling, civil servants comprised the bulk of personnel she used to establish the academy, which is now attracting patronage from all over the country in just one year of its existence.
While taking journalists and social media influencers around the magnificent academy, Ajoonu paid glowing tributes to Governor Godwin Obaseki for his foresight in establishing the academy.
Participants at the JOOPSA Open House were drawn from the media, civil society, academia, religion, social media activists, entrepreneurs, professionals, among others.
According to Ajoonu, “We have trained over 7,000 people since we started last year, and His Excellency always says that the civil and public service is the engine room of government so we must train our workforce as a matter of urgency. “He is not going to reap the benefits of this pace, but imagine what it will be in the next ten years if we consistently upscale and train our people,” Ajoonu noted.
Tracing the trajectory of the academy, she added, “When I was drafted to come and operationalize this academy, the governor told me he wants to build a world-class training center. “I asked the governor if I will be allowed to do things on my own or just be a yes-man because one of the things we did not want to do was to put a template and just start running training. “There is a report that this place was organizing training.
So, we decided to involve the civil servants so that whatever we are going to do will be sustainable, and that was how I asked all the ministries to send personnel to us, including the Civil Service Commission.
“I requested those who were currently doing training in the service, and I brought all of them here. Some were skeptical and believed it would not work, but I said if we can convince these critics, then we can make progress, and that is the success story today.
“All of we collectively produced the training document we are using after the civil servants were convinced that we are not coming like the government as usual. His Excellency did not set this up for political gains because it was not going to give him any,” the academy DG explained.
In his presentation, Dr. Christus Etoka, introduced as a “Mind Engineer,” urged participants to creatively use their minds, stating that it “is what can distinguish a man from others.”
The highlight of the event was the facility tour of the academy by the participants.
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