The Nigerian Army Resource Center on Thursday graduated 19 senior officers made up of 5 retired and serving Major Generals, Brigadiers General, Colonels, DSS and FRSC officials and an educationist of the Strategic Management and Policy Studies Course 1 of 2019 after 36 weeks programme.
Speaking at the ceremony, Chief of Defence Staff, General Abayomi Gabriel Olonisakin urged the graduands who include former GOCs, Theatre Commander, Special Task Force Commander to note that continuous quest for knowledge is for life irrespective of the fact the many of them had been successful in handling numerous complex administrative and operational challenges in the past.
“A senior officer could assume that there is nothing more to add to his vast experience and repository of knowledge in the course of an illustrious career. This in reality is a fallacy, as knowledge must be sought continuously even in retirement; ‘as knowledge is power”, the CDS said.
“For the few among the senior officers who might be exiting the system and reintegrating into civilian life, I make bold to say that the operating environment in the larger civil society is highly unpredictable, dangerously competitive with knowledge driven private and public sectors.
“These realities I am sure informed the COAS to commence this executive programme last year with a robust curriculum on policy, management, entrepreneurship and research methodology for high level officers of your cadre”.
In his address, Chief of Army Staff, Lt. General Tukur Buratai said the idea to establish this course was borne out of my yearning to fill the noticeable gaps in the top echelon of senior officers of the NA in their career management.
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He gave three specific reasons for conceiving the programme saying, “To adequately prepare top level senior officers on how to understand and examine security from another prism, particularly private and public entrepreneurial ventures; to help promote inter agency cooperation and to develop a critical thinking mass at the top echelon on the Nigerian Army.
The COAS added that the theme for the programme was carefully selected based on “Food Sufficiency as a major factor in the National Security Architecture of Nigeria”.
Earlier, Director General (DG) of the Nigerian Army Resource Centre, Major General Garba Wahab (rtd), in his welcome address said, “The change in the meaning of security, increase in threats and nature of challenges in the world generally and in the country in particular, necessitate the need for human capacity development.
“A fallout is the need for senior military officers to acquire skills and requisite knowledge needed to operate successfully in any environment and condition. This unequivocally calls for the need to examine security from other perspectives.
“It is against this background that the COAS tasked the NARC to develop a curriculum to facilitate the training of senior military officers and their counterparts in the Paramilitary and civil organizations. Consequently, the NARC in collaboration with the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA) School of Postgraduate Studies conceptualized the course curriculum and inaugurated the first batch of SMPSC on 19th November 2018.
Some of the 19 participants are Major General AB Abubakar (rtd), former GOC 82 division, Major General Nicholas Rogers (rtd), former Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Anthony Atolagbe, former STF Commander, Operation Safe Haven, Jos and Major General Ahmed Mohammed (rtd), former CTOP at Defence headquarters.
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