In the last couple of weeks, young Nigerian inventors, innovators and scientists have been involved in Global competitions to test their abilities against some of the World’s best.
And it appears the nation’s technological future is a safe bet for global recognition and impact.
First the nation took the world by storm at the World Adolescent Robotic Competition in China were Nigeria won gold for proper documentation of processes on engineering note.
Then it was the turn of an all-girls Nigerian techies whose invention – a mobile application called ‘FD Detector’ to tackle the problems of fake pharmaceutical products in Nigeria – won them a gold medal at the 2018 Technovation World competition held in the United States two days ago.
Now the second Global Robotic Olympiad (GRO) will kick off in Mexico on Monday, and Nigeria’s five representatives have vowed to come back with at least three gold medals from the competition.
The students will join 193 teams from 187 countries for the competition.
A team of seven students that represented the country in the maiden edition of the competition in Washington DC, U.S in 2017, came third out of 41 African countries that participated in the competition.
They were ranked 25th out of 162 countries across the world and they also got two other awards.
The students believe their sacrifices, hard work and commitment during the preparation will see them winning gold medals.
A 16-year-old Anjolaoluwa Olowokere of Lagoon Secondary School, Aja, Lagos, said that the team had worked hard in planning, designing and building their robotics.
“This is a global robotic competition and the team is well prepared for it.
“We are extremely happy to represent the country. We are going to bring home three gold medals.
“I am confident we will get a gold medal in the ‘Zhangzheng Award of Engineering Design’, one of the award categories.
“It is an award given to the country or team with the best engineering design of robotics.
“Another award category, I am confident of is the ‘First Global Alliance Award’ where three teams or countries come together to form an alliance where the best country wins.
“We can only hope that with everything we have done and with God on our side, we will come out victorious,” Olowokere said.
Also, Dodie Iroaganachi, 17 of Queens College, Lagos, said: “ We hope to come out top 10 among the 193 teams from 187 countries.”
Samuel Mbah, 16 of Osezele Comprehensive Senior School, Lagos, said that the team would perform creditably well in the competition.
Mbah said that they had put in their best during preparation for the competition, adding that they would make the country and their sponsors, Aramex Technology, proud.
At a news conference, Faisal Jarmakani, the Managing Director of Aramex and Doculand Nigeria, said that the 2018 challenge in Mexico would be on “Energy Impact”.
According to him, competitors will be expected to solve problems related to energy with the use of robotics.
Jarmakani said that all the students were building foundation blocks for a technology-advanced Nigeria.
“Without any doubt, we will soon join other countries of the world where science and technology have become the backbone of economic development,’’ he said.