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From Tony Osauzo, Benin
John Odigie Oyegun Public Service Academy (JOOPSA) has trained 7,000 people in its one year of existence.
Director General, Precious Imuwahen Ajoonu, who disclosed this during ‘JOOPSA Open House’ programme, said contrary to insinuations that civil servants were not productive, they constituted 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, and commended Governor Godwin Obaseki for the foresight in establishing the academy.
Participants at the event were drawn from the media, civil society, academia, religion, social media activists, entrepreneurs, and professionals among others.
“We have trained over 7,000 people since we started last year, and his excellency has always said 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 place, but imagine what it will be in the next 10 years if we consistently upscale and train our people.
“When I was drafted to come and operationalise this academy, the governor told me he wanted to build a world class training centre.
“I asked the governor if I would 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 organising 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 for those who were currently doing training in the service, and I brought all of them here. Some of them were skeptical, and believed it would not work, but I said if we could convince these critics, then we could make progress, and that is the success story today.
“The training document we are using was collectively produced by all of us after the civil servants were convinced we were not coming like the government as usual. His excellency did not set this up for political gains,” Ajoonu said.
In his presentation, Christus Etoka, while speaking on “Mindset Flexibility,” urged participants to be open-minded and creatively use their minds.
He disclosed that four Es – Experience, Education, Exposure and Environment, constitute what make the mind, adding that a fixed mindset was a problem to seeking development and advancement of society, even as he encouraged people to be flexible in their minds.
