The Upper East Regional Minister, Hon. Stephen Yakubu has commissioned a state-of-the-art engineering workshop on the campus of the Bolgatanga Technical University (BTU) to help train students with the needed skills for industries in Ghana.
The facility, intended to churn-out competency-based skilled students, has a set of five electrical and electronics equipment, six sets of mechanical engineering laboratory equipment, five sets of civil engineering laboratory equipment, five sets of automotive repair engineering laboratory equipment and five sets of welding engineering laboratory equipment with a set of diesel generating unit of 200kilowatt power.
Speaking at a ceremony to commission the facility, Hon. Yakubu said the government of President Akufo-Addo was gradually changing the face of education as it trains students with practical base knowledge to enable them create their own jobs and employ others.
“I think the Nana Akufo-Addo’s government is going in the best direction, thinking outside the box and identifying what it can do new to propel the development of our beloved country to grow faster than it has been over the past 60years,” he said.
He said for the past 60years of Independence, Ghana had not seen adequate development, and was hopeful that with the state-of-the-art facilities spread across the country, it would equip the young people to drive the country’s industries to catch-up with other advanced countries.
The Minister, who later addressed the 10th Congregation of the University, urged the graduates of University to inculcate in themselves the “can do spirit” and create their own jobs, as the era of post graduate guaranteed employment was over.
“You will now have to fashion out your own destiny, the times we live now calls for creativity, thinking outside the box and the ‘can do spirit’. There is indeed limited room for conventional thinking, and that is the essential ingredient to success in whatever you choose to do, and do not be afraid to be different,” he advised.
Hon. Yakubu said government had committed about one billion dollars to revamp Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) to make it attractive and further increase the contributions of the vocational and technical skilled personnel in the industrial sector of the economy.
He said plans were underway to cut sods for the construction of 32 modern training centers across the country, adding that government, acting on Act 1023, formed a Committee to establish the Ghana Skills Development Fund for government and industries to contribute to the fund.
As part of the graduation ceremony, Professor Samuel Erasmus Alnaa, was invested into office as the First Vice Chancellor amidst cultural displays, after 15years of diligent service to the University.
He started as a lecturer in the then Bolgatanga Polytechnic in 2007 and rose through the ranks by dint of hard work to become Associate Professor in Economics in 2016.