Nigeria’s First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, has encouraged women across the country to embrace humble beginnings as they grow in digital skills and entrepreneurship. She delivered this message at the closing ceremony of the 2025 Renewed Hope Initiative and National Information Technology Development Agency Women ICT Training Empowerment Programme.
Addressing the participants, Senator Tinubu urged them to overcome fear and uncertainty by taking bold steps, even if small, toward building meaningful digital careers.
“Don’t be afraid to start small. Somebody, especially when you do it small and do it very well, somebody will take note,” she said.
She reflected on her experience establishing the Alternative High School for Girls during her tenure as Lagos State First Lady, noting how a single experimental initiative has now expanded into more than 40 thriving institutions nationwide. She described this growth as proof that small beginnings can evolve into national impact.
Senator Tinubu applauded the ICT empowerment programme’s expansion from an initial 35 trainees to 607 women across various states, describing the participants as ambassadors of digital literacy. She encouraged them to apply their newly acquired skills and continue advancing in the digital space.
Earlier, the Director General of NITDA, Mallam Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, emphasized the importance of empowering women as part of Nigeria’s digital transformation agenda. He highlighted President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s commitment to equipping women with digital tools and capabilities needed for economic inclusion and national development.
He reaffirmed NITDA’s vision of fostering an empowered and digitally fluent population, stressing that Nigeria cannot achieve its ambition of becoming a one trillion US Dollar economy without fully integrating women into the technological landscape.
“In the 21st century, the illiterate are those who cannot use digital devices. We want every Nigerian to develop digital fluency not just to access the digital economy, but to actively participate in it,” he said.
The ceremony marked another milestone in the Federal Government’s drive toward achieving 95 percent digital literacy by 2030.
