The Deputy Minister of Technical and Higher Education, Sarjoh Aziz-Kamara has been recognized as a Dongfang Scholar by the Peking University in China. He participated in a month-long programme from 20th October to 18th November, together with 51 emerging leaders representing 51 countries across Africa, Asia, Central and South America, the Pacific and Oceania.
The fellowship provided a meaningful opportunity to learn from China’s history, culture, development models, technological innovation and educational transformation. The program included academic sessions delivered by eminent professors at Peking University and visiting professors, giving an insight into China’s educational transformation and sustainable development. Further field visits undertaken in Hunan and Xinjiang Provinces, provided and opportunity for the Deputy Minister to understand the Chinese culture and development orientation. The interaction with Chinese locals provided a unique opportunity to experience first-hand the impact of China’s reported poverty alleviation efforts, human capital development and benefits of long-term national development vision.
The Deputy Minister, had several high-level engagements with officials of the leadership of the Communist Party of China. He distinguished himself as keynote speaker at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing and with Hunan provincial authorities, where he acknowledged China’s development and its longstanding partnership with the global South. In his remarks, he reiterated Africa’s call for urgent UN Security Council reform on behalf of Sierra Leone, echoing President Bio’s continued advocacy for Africa’s permanent membership in the UN Security Council.
Deputy Minister acknowledged China’s significant contribution to develop the human capital of Sierra Leone as a driver of sustainable development. He particularly noted the award of scholarships as more than 500 Sierra Leoneans have benefitted from studies in Chinese universities to date and over 5,000 personnel have undertaken short term courses aimed at developing their skills and capabilities for nation building.
During his scholarly program at Peking University, Deputy Minister took time to have positive meetings to strengthen partnership with Chinese institutions. He visited Beifang Automotive in Beijing to build on existing relationship for Sierra Leone to benefit from in-house and online training for maintenance of electric vehicles and provision of training equipment to technical institutes. He further finalised an MoU with Wuhan University to promote research and academic partnership with our higher education institutions.
Upon successful completion of the program, Deputy Minister was presented with a certificate by the President of the Peking University and recognised as an Alumnus of the university with full rights and privileges.