Civil Servants Don’t Have the Skills They Need – HoS Oyo-Ita

The Head of Civil Service of the Federation (HoCSF), Mrs. Winifred Oyo-Ita, has said that shortage of people with the necessary skills and lack of work experience are obstacles to filling positions in most MDAs.

She made the statement last week in Abuja while unveiling the findings of the Training Needs Assessment, (TNA) at a meeting with the Chief Executive Officers of Manpower Development Institutions, (MDIs).

The survey showed that civil servants’ skills deficiency was alarming, hence the need for training and retraining to address the deficiencies.

She said that a Structured Assessment-Based Training Programme (SMAT-P), and Leadership Enhancement and Development Programme (LEAD-P), both of which are targeted at training at least 25,000 civil servants by 2020, will kick off in May.

“A lot of civil servants after the initial training they get when coming in, they are left like that. Even when they are promoted, they are not further trained,” she said.

The TNA survey was administered on 1,076 civil servants between grade levels 7-17, out of which 670 responded.