14th July, 2019
Lagos State Government is partnering with Germany on knowledge transfer for occupational safety and health in the state.
Director-General/Chief Executive Officer, CEO, Lagos State Safety Commission, Hakeem Dickson, spoke in Alausa,Lagos, Southwest Nigeria while receiving delegates from Germany.
According to Dickson, the state was committed to the overall safety of lives and property of residents, hence the idea behind the improvement of the knowledge transfer for occupational safety and health, which would afford many Nigerians the opportunity of safeguarding themselves in the event of any emergencies, occurrences and unfortunate incidents.
The DG stated that it was in fulfillment of its mandate that made his agency, in conjunction with the Safety Advocacy Empowerment Foundation, SAEF, met with technocrats, led by Dr Christian Bechmann and Steven Timn, from Germany.
He explained that the whole idea was to increase methodology in the area of presentation, as different methods would be employed, adding that “even those in secondary schools and undergraduates, by the time we train them on safety, it would enhance their employability.”
Dickson disclosed that the German team would begin by training 50 people, but that only six out of the number would end up studying in Germany before they would eventually come back to the country to train about 23,000 people, cutting across every sections in Nigeria, otherwise known as train the trainers, which had been approved by the European Commission.
In his words: “The whole idea is to train us, what we want and how do we go about it. So they would go back to Germany and write the summary of what we want and develop their curriculum for us and come back again to train 50 people.
“When you get back to Germany, in your report, we need more. You can see the population of Nigeria. Here in Lagos, its over 25 millions. Even schools can be established for us. We need more of your equipment for training.”
According to Dickson, more of the training became necessary in view of the need to sensitise relevant stakeholders on safety measures, saying that as a responsible and responsive agency, it would continue to perform its mandate through sustained advocacy on safety till it got to every nooks and crannies of the State.
Speaking, Head of Service, Hakeem Muri-Okunola, commended Safety Advocacy and Empowerment Foundation (SAEF) on her proactive measures in getting the project on track, saying that the training would go a long way in preventing occupational hazards.
“Lagos is densely populated and the number of people to be trained should be increased for wider coverage, I believe this will give room for more beneficiaries of this noble and global programme and thus paves way to increase level of employability,” he said.
President of SAEF, Dapo Omolade, commended the Lagos State Safety Commission for its commitment to the overall safety of everybody by supporting the activities and programmes that would promote safety in the State, especially the knowledge transfer for occupational safety and health programme in Nigeria.