The new centre was inaugurated by Mr Romain Atafeitom Tagba, Director of the Cabinet of Togolese Minister of Posts and Telecommunications; Mr Michel Ouedraogo, Director-General of CTML; and Mr Robert Shaw, Head of Human Capacity Building with ITU’s Telecommunication Development Bureau (BDT), on behalf of BDT Director Mr Sami Al Basheer Al Morshid.
It was established as a result of a request from CMTL in April this year, and was opened in conjunction with a meeting of the Steering Committee of the ITU Academy Centres of Excellence network in Africa, which is taking place on 9-10 December.
Five instructors are now being trained in the Cisco Certified Networking Academy (CCNA) curriculum, using a train-the-trainer approach. The curriculum will then be offered to students at CMTL from 2011.
The world-class ICT training available at the Centre will enable more young people from Togo and the West African region to gain industry-recognized certification and skills that will be in strong demand in today’s and tomorrow’s labour market. Developed under the auspices of the ITU Academy programme (http://academy.itu.int), the new Centre is part of a broader effort by ITU and its partners to extend the benefits of ICTs to people everywhere and prepare countries for a broadband-enabled economy.
"The skills taught at this new Internet Training Centre will help young Africans from all socio-economic strata establish exciting and well-paid careers in the booming ICT sector – a sector which has been responsible for creating more jobs over the past five years than any other industry,” said ITU Secretary-General Dr Hamadoun Touré.
The technical training offered at the Centre is complemented by training in soft skills and entrepreneurship, to help students launch their own businesses and promote technological empowerment as a path to economic and social development. ITU will initially supply one set of Security Premium lab equipment to teach the curriculum, which will also enable the Centre to later offer a more advanced security curriculum.
ITU’s Internet Training Centre initiative was launched in 2001, with Cisco Systems as the first major global partner. In the 10 years since, it has grown into a network of more 80 Internet Training Centres around the world, with additional partners including the European Commission, Microsoft, Inveneo and local training/education institutes in different regions.