Human beings right from creation were made to believe that a way forward in life towards development is that of creative imagination. If you want to be close to nature, you need to improve on your level of consciousness.

To create this constant consciousness, human beings have sustained creative and innovative thinking as a means of furthering their lives. And they have done this through so many ways. One of the ways is technical vocational education and training (TVET). For us, this is a means through which one can improve on one’s creative imagination and level of consciousness.

Education has, therefore, helped stimulate human consciousness and creation of imagination, and facilitated the achievement of the recorded advances in human development in many ways than one. But most importantly, education, especially technical and vocational education and training has helped create a new league of technologies, discoveries, life-changing breakthroughs and new ways of doing things. Indeed, education is a means through which people’s cultural heritage as well as occupational skills is transmitted from one generation to another.

In traditional African societies, education has always been seen as tool that enables the individual to become functional member of the society. Education has almost always served as an instrument for elevating people from one level to the next, and enabling them contribute more meaningfully to the development of their communities, states and nations.

However, technical vocational education and training has remained the major engine for imparting imaginative and innovative skills that have resulted in the development of craftsmen, technicians, and other skilled personnel, who have driven the society towards enterprise and self-reliance. These craftsmen, technicians and other technical specialists have been the drivers of the many parts of the development process.

It is obvious that this crop of people have propelled the development of nations. They have been the engines of development at all levels, including technological development. I think, therefore, that no nation can develop without the efficient harnessing of this critical mass of human and material resources, and putting them to productive use.

Perhaps, it is necessary to highlight the importance of technical and vocational education and training to the development process of the country. TVET encompasses the recruitment and engagement of the youths, particularly young secondary school leavers, graduands of technical colleges, and university and polytechnic graduates in apprenticeship programmes to enable them acquire skills necessary to become proficient in a trade, craft and or a profession under the tutelage of a specialist.

The apprentices are then engaged in some capacity building and skills development process for a period between six and 18 months. During the period, they are put through hands-on training, especially practical exercises, to enable the trainees understudy the critical processes in the various fields. Some of the trainees are trained in catering, carpentry and upholstery making, auto-mechanic and electrical repairs, machinery parts fabrication, and other more technical areas, particularly in the oil and gas industry.

This kind of programme, no doubt, increases the capacity of the nation’s human resource to effectively utilise available natural resources. It is indeed, when these natural resources are optimally utilised that industrialisation can take place, and by extension, economic development. It is, therefore, important that to achieve any meaningful development, about 70 per cent of the youths should be enrolled in courses that emphasise the acquisition of vocational and technical skills in the various tertiary institutions.

Methinks that if graduates of technically-related courses are trained and retrained by their employers to bring out the full potentials in them, this country would easily achieve its dream of being one of the 20 biggest economies by 2020. It is not surprising that the United States and most other industrialised economies attained their status as a result of technological advancement through the application of technical and vocational education and training. Take for instance, the world’s leading software developers, computer operating systems specialists, internet inventors, information and communication technologists; they have, in no small measure changed the direction of the world. Such gurus as Microsoft inventor, William Bill Gates, Lawrence Jellison of California, Steve Jobs, all of United States; Carlos Slim Helu of Mexico, and US-based Nigerian-born Phillip Emeagwali, have one thing in common: They made it through the application of TVET.

This is why I think the idea of TVET should be taken by every Nigerian as a major means of economic breakthrough. It should form a cardinal aspect of the development process of every Nigerian, from the youth to the adult. Of a truth, if every individual who understands the philosophy behind TVET should impart such knowledge into others through strictly practical application of the skills acquired, the development process of Nigeria would be smooth and quick.

I believe that every human being has been endowed with innate abilities and capacities to effect significant change around his or her environment. But it is through the effective deployment of these natural talents that society can witness that change. Thus, every Nigerian must genuinely contribute his or her natural endowments, and indeed, tap those hidden talents capable of unleashing unusual changes in society so that this nation can move forward.

It was John F. Kennedy, who told the American as president, that he should, “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.” I think it is right time for us as Nigerians to stop asking what this country can offer us as citizens. We owe it a duty to contribute in every way possible to the development of the nation. We must do those unusual things that create extraordinary opportunities and advances in development through the unleashing of our latent skills and potentials. We must task our latent intuitive knowledge, and do extraordinary things to move Nigeria to the next level. Let’s task ourselves, and challenge the inner reasoning for positive manifestation of the true character of the nation.

Interestingly, Nigeria began its journey to statehood on sound economic foundations. But poor leadership and governance have collectively robbed the nation of many opportunities to progress to the next level. Corruption has been a major bane of the nation’s development. And it is only natural that the nation turns a new leaf today by jettisoning those vices that have worked to scuttle efforts to advance Nigeria’s development paradigm, and conscientiously implement policies that focus on TVET.

If the developed countries have attained the level of development they are today through the application of TVET, then Nigeria has no option but to do the same. I, therefore, advise the government at all levels, corporate citizens, non-governmental organisations, individuals, institutions, agencies, and development partners to embrace TVET in efforts to develop Nigeria. I think that this is the way to go because TVET leads to many things.

TVET results in economic development, self-reliance and actualisation. Huge investment into the future, exposes the innate potentials in man, achieves sustainable technological development and advancement, and general socio-economic and political development and stability. And I think, these are the things the nation needs now. Nigerians, let’s begin to: Imagine. Think. Believe. And Create.

Nwaeze writes from University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

Prince Udoma Nwaeze