By Abubakar Basiru
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| ABU students with their Huawei ICT award cheques: N16 million total. |
Students of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, were among Nigerian participants honoured with cash rewards at the 3rd edition of the Huawei Education Summit (THES26), held in Abuja on Thursday, July 30, 2026.
The awards recognised students who represented Nigeria, under the Huawei Southern Africa region, at the 2025/2026 Huawei ICT Skills Competition Global Finals held in Shenzhen, China, from June 2 to 5, 2026.
The global competition featured 177 teams from 40 countries competing in the Network, Cloud, Computing, and AI/Innovation tracks. The 2025/2026 edition began in October 2025 and attracted more than 220,000 students worldwide.
A major show of the summit was the of cash prizes to Nigerian students who excelled at the global finals. A total of N16 million was distributed among the country's winning teams.
ABU student Yunusa Mohammed, a member of Nigeria's Computing Track team, which finished second, received a share of a N2.5 million reward.
The two Nigerian Cloud Track teams (Team 1 and Team 2), which secured first position, included three ABU students—Abdulroqeeb Adekunle, Shefiu Wakili and Musa Yakubu—and were rewarded with N3.5 million.
The all-female Nigerian Network Track team, which won the grand prize, included ABU student Kumba-Bana Tekanyi and received N5 million.
Another N5 million was presented to the Nigerian AI/Innovation team, TeamABU2026, comprising Ruqqayyah Labo, Khadija Khalid and Grace Olorunfemi, for winning the grand prize with ParaVision at the global finals.
The summit brought together leaders of the National Universities Commission (NUC), National Board for Technical Education (NBTE), National Commission for Colleges of Education (NCCE), and the Administrative Staff College of Nigeria (ASCON). Vice-Chancellors, ICT directors and academics from universities, polytechnics and colleges of education also attended.
The theme of this year's summit was "Accelerating Digital Education in Nigeria: Leveraging Emerging Technologies for Transformative Education."
Among the presentations delivered at the event, the Lead of the ABU Huawei Advanced ICT Academy Support Centre (AIASC), Prof. M. B. Mu'azu, spoke on "Insights to IGR for Schools," while the Director of ABU IAIICT, Prof. E. A. Adedokun, presented "Case Sharing: ABU Smart Campus."
Also present at the summit were Dr. Bashir Sani, ABU Huawei AIASC Technical Lead; Nasiru Lawal, ABU Network Refresh Project Manager and Huawei AIASC Instructor; and Maryam Ololade Jimoh.