News

His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, President of the United Arab Emirates, and His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President, Prime Minister of the UAE, Ruler of Dubai and Minister of Defense, recently attended the first edition of the NAFIS Award 2022-2023 at Qasr Al Watan to recognise the winners. 

His Highness Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Vice President, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Presidential Court and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Emirati Talent Competitiveness Council were and Lt. General H.H. Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior also attended. 

During the award ceremony H.H. Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed emphasised the need to empower skilled and qualified national workforce as a top priority, and should be supported by all institutions, government departments, and private sector partners working together. He expressed confidence in Emiratis’ ability to drive the country’s economic leadership and competitiveness in various fields.

NAFIS is an annual award launched under the patronage of H.H. Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan. It is supervised by the Emirati Talent Competitiveness Council in partnership with the NAFIS Programme, which was setup in September 2021 by the Council as part of “Projects of the 50” to achieve the UAE Vision 2071. The NAFIS Award encourages skilled Emirati’s to work productively and competitively in the labor market, while attracting young people to work in the private sector as their first choice after graduation.

The private sector trainee’s category was won by Abdulla Khaled Ali Al Raeesi, under the category of the best performance Emirati trainees among the private sector companies in the UAE. Abdulla Alraeesi is a Global Air Navigation Services (GANS) Air Traffic Control officer at Abu Dhabi International Airport. He attended and passed GANS scholarship training program. The scholarship training program takes place at GANS state of the art training academy in Al Ain, for Air Traffic Controllers, Air Traffic Engineers and other Air Traffic Control disciplines.