Recently, President Muhammadu Buhari signed the National Council for Social Work Establishment Bill 2022 as part of measures to effectively regulate the social work practice in the country. The law seeks to legalise social work practice in the country and bring it in tandem with global best practices.
Tagged Social Works Act No. 25 of 2022, the law is the regulatory framework that will regulate, legalise, monitor and control the activities of social workers in the country the way it is done in other countries.
For the sake of emphasis, the social work discipline is an applied behavioural profession that promotes human rights, social justice, peace, and conflict resolution while also engendering social change, problem-solving and sustainable development in human relationships.
Now more than ever before, Nigeria needs the services of social workers with all the plethora of challenges confronting the nation, some of which have engendered a fractured relationship among the citizenry.
It is fitting to note that the new law seeks to establish the National Council for Social Work that would regulate social work practice in the country. Interestingly, a governing body that will be appointed by the federal government will regulate the Council’s activities.
The law empowers the Council to determine what standards of knowledge and skills are expected of persons seeking to become members of the profession of social work and review those standards from time to time, as circumstances demand.
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