Day 3: Dairies of a Minister
Overheard around the Ministry today by someone visiting me “you nor dae go na you office ehn? Minister dae visit office den ya” (won’t you go to your office? Minister does office visits).
Yes, I will visit and remain hands-on.
So I visited the Science and Technology Secretariat again today (it was locked last time I went). I am the first Minister to visit since the day it was opened by the then Deputy Minister of Education some 15+ years ago. Not more than 1 of my current senior staff had visited it in the last 5 years.
The Education Act of 2004, Section 54 gives power to the Science and Technology Council to provide “policy guidance relating to the development, dissemination and application of science and technology countrywide”.
The state of the Secretariat is reflective of our state of science education over the last decade in SL: 3 members of the Council are dead; the chair of the Council resigned years ago; the secretariat has 3 employees- the Executive Secretary, a secretary and a driver. There was a single computer in the space and everything else paper (Some of the records themselves were from a typewriter.)
I am lucky to double as CIO because I know that within the last year, #DSTI_SierraLeone has informed education policy across the board locally and internationally.
Sierra Leone shall become a leader in Education again!
#PaopaSaloneGoBetteh
#ThisRevolutionShallBeDigitized
