Nigeria’s pace-setting leader in the engineering construction sector, Julius Berger Nigeria Plc, has graduated its first set of trainees from the company’s Plant and Equipment Academy in Abuja.
The company commissioned and launched the academy earlier in the year.
The company’s Managing Director, Engr. Lars Richter, who was represented by the company’s executive director of administration, Alhaji Zubairu Ibrahim Bayi, described the event as an epoch-making milestone in the anals of the company.
He proudly celebrated “the successful graduation of the first set of artisanal trainees to pass through the strategic Julius Berger Plant and Equipment Academy.”
Bayi particularly welcomed Julius Berger’s strategic partners for the work of the Academy, the Armed Forces Electrical and Mechanical Engineering Mechatronic School (AFEME), managed by the Nigerian military in collaboration with the German Technical Advisory Group.
Speaking further, Bayi stated, “Our operational cooperation has seen AFEME deliver on all theoretical aspects of the Academy’s curriculum while Julius Berger took charge of the practical aspects of the training programme…that functional synergy of purpose has successfully led us to this celebratory moment, where we are now graduating trainees from the JBN Academy.”
Bayi stated that the idea, its conceptualization, launch and the focused implementation of the academy derived from the company’s partnership approach to Nigeria’s well-rounded development, and is “a proud anchor of Julius Berger’s lasting patriotic faith in the unstoppable success of the Nigerian industrial self-reliance project.”
Notably, with a start-up number of eight trainees in the pioneers’ class for technical handling and maintenance of internal combustion engines, six trainees successfully passed both the rigorous theoretical and practical training modules.
While thanking the managers and facilitators of the academy for their commitment to the excellent idea and ideals of the unique institution, Bayi also used the occasion to congratulate the graduating trainees for their disciplined commitment to their studies and success.
He wished the successful graduands the best in their career endeavours going forward and charged them as worthy alumni of the Julius Berger Plant and Equipment Academy to remain good ambassadors of the potentially great Academy both in practice and in character.
Industry watchers consider the emergence of the academy as a brilliant and strategic initiative with due regard to the country’s much needed technical industrial self-reliance and development.
