Peter Obi, a presidential candidate for the Labour Party (LP) in the elections of 2023, has declared that he concurs with recent remarks made by Bill Gates on the surge of young Nigerian professionals leaving Nigeria for better opportunities.
The co-founder of Microsoft spoke about the “Japa” phenomenon on Wednesday in Lagos State during an interactive session with innovators on “Advancing Africa: Unleashing the Power of Youth in Science and Innovation.”
If you increase the amount of training you do, it’s sort of a good thing that people are leaving.
“It’s very healthy to have a large diaspora that includes people returning to government and business.”
When the government finances medical education, according to Gates, “one almost wishes that a little bit of that resource you get overseas would help the government increase the training.”
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Otherwise, he said, some of those skills are severely in short supply.
“I’m not someone who believes that no one should go away or that blocking that completely is a healthy thing,” the philanthropist had emphasised.
He emphasised that many creative immigrant doctors had completed some of their training in the UK and the US, drawing comparisons between Nigeria and India and China in the export of talent.
If you can find a way to balance this and figure out the funding for education component of it, it’s a very healthy thing for computer science, for health, for business, and for other fields.
You say, ‘Some of our doctors can go get a very high salary in the UK or the US.’ Gates stated that some of them “will pay to their family broadly and some of them will return.”
Peter Obi responded on Thursday morning by expressing agreement with Bill Gates’ remark.
According to reports, Bill Gates recently commented on the “Japa” syndrome and said that the recent influx of Nigerian professionals leaving the country in search of better opportunities is beneficial and healthy for our nation. I have read that and agree with it, the former governor of Anambra said.
