The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Mrs. Winifred Oyo-Ita, has stated that training and retraining of Federal Public Servants is essential to development of the nation and will no longer be a welfare package used to douse Labour tensions.
Mrs. Oyo-Ita stated this today in her office in Abuja while inaugurating Departmental Training Officers (DTOs) of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government.
The Head of Service further explained that the inauguration was part of efforts to achieve the recently signed Executive Orders by Acting President Yemi Osinbajo, which is aimed at easing business and fast tracking budget submissions.
She noted that over the years, training has become a welfare package without Government getting the true value for the money spent on training of Public Servants, which she said has made the quality of output from Public Servants very questionable.
She said “In those days Directors of Administration and personnel sit and defend their training budget and work plan and that kept the MDAs focused and that is what we are bringing back now. If we are not properly trained we cannot transfer any form of excellence into the business of the country.”
Mrs. Oyo- Ita said that the goal of the Office of the Head of Service was to enhance capacity of development in the service by making it proactive, result oriented and a catalyst for national development.
The Head of Service added that it had become imperative to reposition our human capacity development system through formidableDTOs platform for proper coordination, implementation and monitoring of training activities within respective MDAs.
Oyo-Ita said that her office would partner with the DTOs forum to achieve these objectives; Conduct Employees Training Needs Assessment, Design/ Review of Training Curriculum, Revise MDAs Training guidelines among others.
According to her, the Public Service is the main instrument through which Government implements and administers public policies and programmes.
And therefore called on the DTOs to be committed and render the necessary assistance required for the effective implementation of all training programmes in the MDAs.
Earlier, the Permanent Secretary Career Management Office, in the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation Dr. (Mrs) Folashade Yemi-Esan, said that training must stop being a welfare package. Stressing further that gone are the days when people are sent on training and they come back with nothing.
Yemi-Esan added that the training of DTOs would bring the desired change and participants would serve as change agents. Adding that a lot has been done in recent times to improve the Public Service and one of that is the signing of Executive Orders and the inauguration of Civil Service Strategic Plan.
She stressed that Civil Servants are at the centre of driving these instructions and without adequate training it cannot be achieved.
However one of the participants Mrs Omobola Adenuga, Deputy Director Training in the Federal Ministry of Science and Technology pledged the commitment of the DTOs to ensuring the set goals were achieved.
She said that they would ensure they formulate training proposals that will be relevant to their organisations.
