James Sowole in Abeokuta
A telecommunication and mobile money services company, Airtel Africa, and the United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) have announced a five-year pan-African partnership to help accelerate the roll-out of digital learning in schools through internet connection, as well as ensuring free access to learning platforms across 13 countries.
The UNICEF Communication Officer, Blessing Ejiofor, disclosed the new partnership yesterday in a statement made available to journalists.
She stated that the Airtel Africa and UNICEF, under the new initiative, are planning to help connect schools in Lagos and Kano States to the internet to enable children to learn digitally.
The pilot initiative, she added, was expected to benefit over 10,000 schoolchildren in the two states.
By providing equal access to quality digital learning, particularly for the most vulnerable children, the partnership will help to ensure that every child reaches their full potential.
According to the statement, “Airtel Africa is the first African private sector partner to make a multimillion-dollar commitment to ‘Reimagine Education’, a global initiative launched by UNICEF in 2020 calling for public and private sector investment in digital learning as an essential service for every child and young person across the globe.
“This initiative is aimed at giving children the chance to catch up on their learning needs amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.”
UNICEF Executive Director, Henrietta Fore, said: “Hundreds of millions of children in Africa have seen their education disrupted or put on hold because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“By championing digital education for children in Africa, this partnership with Airtel Africa will help put children’s learning back on track.”
Also, UNICEF Nigeria Representative, Peter Hawkins, noted that: “Digital learning is the gateway to equipping young people with the right skills that will support them to transition from learning to earning. We are delighted that Airtel Nigeria shares in this vision, and is helping to drive the process of scaling up internet connectivity for school children in Nigeria.”
In his remark, the Chief Executive Officer of Airtel Africa, Olusegun Ogunsanya, said: “Airtel Africa’s financial and in-kind contribution for this partnership is $57 million over five years to 2027.
“The programme will call on technology and expertise in addition to direct financial support to connect schools and communities to the internet, enable free access to online educational content for learners. It will also provide vital data insights to inform UNICEF’s work to scale-up digital learning and help ensure it is sustainable as well as meets students’ needs across Africa.
“As a business, we have focused on education as the key area of our corporate social responsibility, and we are delighted that this partnership with UNICEF will enable us to accelerate results. It also coincides with the launch of our new sustainability strategy, which lays out our commitment to education.
“We are excited to be working with UNICEF to advance the education agenda on the continent through the facilitation of connectivity and online access to play a role in driving change.”
The Airtel Africa and UNICEF pan-African partnership will benefit learners not only in Nigeria, but also in Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Niger, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.
