TETFund unveils defence subcommittee on research | EduCeleb
EduCeleb
22nd October 2020
The Tertiary Education Trust Fund, TETFund, has unveiled a 13-man Defence and Security Research and Development Subcommittee to lead efforts on collaborative research in defence and operations.
Speaking during the event at the Nigerian Army headquarters in Abuja, the Executive Secretary of TETFund, Professor Suleiman Bogoro stressed the need for the army to intensify research on defence, innovation and technology.
Professor Bogoro noted that the defence and military sectors of any nation cannot proceed in the 21st century by protecting its citizens through any other means except by injecting innovation which is perfected through research and development.
While stating that in the past, warfare was on the field, the TETFund boss noted that warfare had gone digital and nuclear, this means injection of time, technology and innovation.
He disclosed that the TETFund Research and Development Standing Committee, which is chaired by Professor Njiddah Gadzama, has vice chairmen drawn from the industry, academia, and government in line with the triple helix concept.
Also speaking, the Chairman of the TETFund Research and Development Standing Committee, Professor Gadzama, said no country has made it without strong research and development component of the government.
He called on the military to support the committee in actualising its vision of establishing a national research foundation as without security all the 12 groups including would not achieve anything.
He disclosed that apart from the military, the committee had twelve more research groups including agriculture, environmental resources, medicine, pharmaceuticals, ICT, digital economy, petroleum resources, solid mineral and mining, industrialisation, engineering technology and material science, infrastructural development, education, energy, governance, social development and internal security.
Responding, the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. General Tukur Buratai, backed the call for the establishment of a national research and development foundation, pledging that the military would urge its partners to key into the foundation.
Earlier, the Coordinator of the Defence and Military Subcommittee, Air Vice Marshal Onyemaechi Osahor, who articulated the objectives of the subcommittee, said its “effort is aimed at enhancing the attainment of self-reliance of the armed forces of Nigeria in platform and equipment holding through collaborative research with the academia and industry.”
Osahor further noted that TETFund’s standing committee on R$D was put in place in order to project Nigeria into a knowledge based economy through need-based well-articulated and funded research and development.