OTTI’S EDUCATION REFORMS AND GLOBAL ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES 

Otti’s strategic education policy can lead to refining of semiconductors and advanced technologies that is more rewarding, argues

CHUKWUEMEKA UWANAKA

“In terms of partnership, we don’t believe in grants and aid, rather we seek partnership, believing that there is a lot of value that we can add working together” Gov. Otti (September 26, 2025)

The quote above by Governor Alex Otti of Abia State, during the September 2025 two-day visit by the United States of America (U.S.) Ambassador to Nigeria, Ambassador Richard Mills alongside U.S. Embassy officials to Abia State, provides some context on how the state government’s education sector reforms can align the state with contemporary global economic opportunities, if strategically matched. Given the contemporary changes in U.S. foreign policy on the continent from development assistance to more commercial diplomacy, as well as changes in the domestic environment, there also exists an opportunity for Gov. Otti to nudge the people and economy of the state towards a more intellectually driven and rewarding pathway.

But what were key points of U.S. Ambassador’s visit to Abia State?

While acknowledging the positive outcomes from Gov. Otti’s governance approach, as well as the high value the U.S. places on its partnership with Abia and the Southeast zone of Nigeria, Ambassador Mills emphasized that he was in the state to explore existing opportunities in the state, and deepen partnerships. In his words, ‘there are tremendous opportunities here for our business, our commercial interests, and Nigeria’s’.

And some of the key points of the visit demonstrated this focus on economic diplomacy, in line with foreign policy goals of U.S. President, Donald Trump. The delegation visited the Aba Independent Power Project (IPP), developed by Geometric Power, Nigeria’s only integrated electric power company. Facilities inspected by the American delegation included Geometric Power turbines produced by U.S. firm General Electric (GE), the world’s biggest and oldest electricity equipment manufacturing firm, as well as the Aba IPP digital SCADA facilities.

What then does this pattern of economic diplomacy and focus on technology-based products and services have to do with Otti’s education sector reforms in Abia State?

The recent mid-2025 reports by the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), Deloitte and Mckinsey on global semiconductor labour gaps, provide global economic opportunities that Gov. Otti’s education sector reforms can strategically harness, for efficient return on investment (ROI). The high points of the reports are that by 2030, the global semiconductor industry will require additional one million skilled workers, which by current trends, are not available. The reports highlight a shortage of 67,000 workers in the U.S. , a shortage of over 100,000 engineers in Europe, and a shortfall of over 200,000 engineers in the Asia-Pacific region. Also, the industry will require at least 100,000 middle-tier managers and 10,000 higher-tier leaders—many of whom must come from outside the industry, all by 2030.

While U.S.-based companies hold roughly 46.3 percent of global semiconductor market share, they handle 12 percent of global manufacturing, with Taiwan handling 65 percent, China 15 percent, and South Korea 12 percent, as demonstration of manufacturing concentration. This concentration is also as each global region has developed different skill sets, making it challenging for human resource mobility across markets. The industry also competes with other tech sectors for talent, and 92 percent of tech leaders report challenges finding skilled workers. Essentially, while markets are expanding, with global semiconductor sales rising to $627.6 billion in 2024, and demand continues to rise to an expected $2 trillion in 2032, the talent pool is shrinking.

It is this challenging but viable human resource gap that provides avenues for closer economic partnerships with the U.S., as well as global economic opportunities for the people and economy of Abia State, if Gov. Otti is able to strategically align his education sector reforms accordingly.  For a bit of context, China had $438.7 billion, Taiwan $116.3 billion and South Korea $131.6 billion worth of exports respectively to the U.S. in 2024, consisting largely of semiconductor-based and high-tech products such as integrated circuits, computers, electronic accessories, machine parts, broadcast equipments, electricals, motor vehicles & accessories. These countries are able to attract the type of significant investment and access to U.S.$30 trillion economy that Gov. Otti desires for Abia, because it has the human resource and subsequently industrial base that competitively manufactures high-tech products for the U.S.

In principle, aligning the state’s educational sector towards producing some of the skilled human talent required by the global semiconductor industry by 2030, is a viable proposition. As it is with such tasking propositions, there can be short, medium and long term approaches. For short-medium term, the Core Curriculum Minimum Academic Standard (CCMAS) and Trans-National Education (TNE) policies of 2023 by the National Universities Commission (NUC), provide the policy framework for training and international linkages that allow for training of tertiary education students in Abia, with skill set at the level required by semiconductor industry.

As CCMAS allows universities to enhance their curricula with some level of specialization, the Abia government can pool resources with public and private universities in the state, and modify relevant curriculum in engineering and computing, to meet the training standards of global semiconductor industry. With the TNE policy, the state government can establish cost-effective partnerships with foreign universities such as the National Taiwan University (NTU), whereby qualified students from Abia are also enrolled in the Global Undergraduate Program in Semiconductors (GUPS) at NTU, for joint-degrees. Virtual labs can be deployed for training.

Also, bulk negotiation with NTU on GUPS for Abia students will bring discount, as Taiwan, encourages educational diplomacy. Furthermore, provision can be made for the trade test certification of skilled tech talent involved in tech repairs, to be converted to some level of academic credit as prior learning, for efficient enrollment into the GUPS.

Given the costs involved, a more feasible short-medium term approach may require pooling the engineering, computing, mathematics and physics students with the best test scores from Abia State University (ABSU), Rhema University, Clifford University, Spiritan University and Gregory University – established by the founder of Skill ‘G’, a leading science, technology and innovation firm, at a central hub possibly provided by Skill G. At this location, training will be provided in chip design, silicon assembling, packaging, testing and other determined fields of semiconductor. The students selected via test scores from their first two years of study, can spend most of the remaining 2-3 years of study on practical learning and industrial attachment at this up-scaled facility, after which they will be awarded their degrees.

Skill G has a good record in tech training, development and deployment. Its partnership with Israeli firms comes in handy, given that Israel is one of the leading countries in semiconductors, especially in chip design, R&D and manufacturing equipment. Annapurna Labs, which is the semiconductor arm of Amazon Inc, is originally an Israeli company that was acquired by the $2.4 trillion U.S. tech giant, and is a demonstration of Israel’s strength in the global semiconductor industry. Gov. Otti’s hosting of Israeli Ambassador to Nigeria Michael Freeman in May 2024 in Abia, where partnership opportunities for Abians and Israelis were explored, provides an official platform for cost-effective upgrading of existing Skill G facilities with equipment and training pathways for the training of Abia students in semiconductor areas, and work placement for the graduates.

Abia has experienced semiconductor and technology professionals who can coordinate this proposition. There is Prof. Ndubisi Ekekwe, academic, engineer, founder of the Intel FGPA certified semiconductor firm FASMICRO, who has supported other countries in semiconductor development, and holds industry patents. There is also Chinenye Mba-Uzoukwu, former Microsoft General Manager (Anglophone West Africa) overseeing a seven-country portfolio as a member of the Microsoft EMEA executive management team, who is currently Principal Secretary and Chief Strategy Officer to Governor Otti. Though Gov. Otti had both appointed them to the leadership of Abia State Technological Skills Acquisition Center in September 2025, a lot more can be done with their skills and experience.

As sustainable long-term pathways requires reforms at feeder system, the May 2025 recruitment of 5,300 teachers and lecturers, and plans announced by the state in July 2025 to recruit 4,000 more teachers due to a surge in education demand, should be strategically aligned with some emphasis on producing semiconductor talent. An exchange program can be infused into both the recruitment and education system that enables a minimum of 10 percent of teachers to be recruited from Taiwan, Israel, South Korea, Vietnam, India and China, i.e from countries that have functional semiconductor industry. There are people from these and other educationally advanced countries that desire international teaching and gap year life experience, to support knowledge sharing and train-the-trainers opportunities.

Dr. Kalu Idika Kalu (KIK), Nigeria’s former Finance Minister, can support the Abia government in establishing official and economic linkages with some of these strategic Asian countries. He served as the World Bank Country Economist in the East Asia and Pacific Programme Department covering the Division that included China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. In his almost a decade stint, he supported the economic policy and governance initiatives of these countries that enhanced their integration and economic partnerships with the U.S.- similar to what Gov. Otti is aiming for.

And ‘culture eats strategy for breakfast’, as popularly emphasized in business strategy. Semiconductor education and training are very competitive, and require an educational culture that is already competitive to be feasible. Abia’s high national cutoff mark for national examinations is one of the indicators of its competitive education culture. Abians have similar intense work, study ethic and business acumen (hustle culture) as Taiwanese, South Koreans, Indians, Chinese, so it is a viable concept. The founders and CEOs of leading semiconductor and tech firms TSMC, Nvidia, AMD, Google, IBM and Microsoft, such as Dr. Morris Chang, Jensen Huang, Dr. Lisa Su, Sundai Pichai, Dr. Arvind Krishna and Satya Nadella, have origins from Taiwan and India.

Otti has the expanded worldview and experience to lead in this new vision and iteration for Abia. The Geometric Power Project that was one of the key events during USA Ambassador visit to Abia was a project Otti was involved in its financing during his banking career. Similar to how he evaluated business plans as a banker, his educational policy should be a social investment that targets certain market gaps, in this case global semiconductor industry, for sufficient ROI. Similar to how certain trade and economic patterns evolved among for example Abiriba businesses that gave them a profitable worldview, Otti’s strategic education policy can lead to an iteration of new worldview on semiconductors and advanced technologies that are more rewarding.

And Gov. Otti should be able to personally relate to pathways. The BOFID Decree 25 of 1991 was part of structural economic policies designed by Dr. KIK and others. This policy framework created Nigeria’s current liberal financial industry for the likes of Zenith Bank, Fidelity Bank, UBA, Access and Diamond Bank, where Otti was CEO. Otti continued his trajectory in founding Signature Bank, which launched operations on November 21, 2022. Similar to how Signature Bank had the 40 million unbanked and underbanked Nigerians as its market gap, the one million semiconductor industry human resource gap by 2030, is a market gap Otti should prepare Abia residents to harness.

As Tim Cook, the CEO of U.S. tech giant Apple Inc explained, the manufacturing and supply chain investment of America’s second largest company in China is due to the large talent pool of engineers and technology specialization in China, not necessarily because of cheap labor. This talent pool was developed through the strategic education and socioeconomic policies of Deng Xiaoping as leader of China, and sustained by successors. The pattern is similar for South Korea, Taiwan and other countries, who have billions in positive trade relations with the $30 trillion U.S. economy. This is largely through semiconductor-based supply chain products such as integrated circuits, computers, electronic accessories, machine parts, broadcast equipment, electricals, motor vehicles & accessories. Therefore, one of the major avenues for Gov. Otti to achieve his desired increased U.S. investment in Abia is through strategic education policy and programs, that develop a quantum of high skilled tech talent. With the recent Semiconductor Industry Association report identifying a human resource gap of one million by 2030, the onus is on Gov. Otti to align his current education policies to produce talent that meets global semiconductor needs. That way, his aspiration of attracting more investment from major U.S. companies- not foreign aid, becomes more feasible.

Dr. Uwanaka writes from African University of Science and Technology, Abuja. chukweks@yahoo.com