By Bassey Nkponam
UYO
The Akwa Ibom governor has decried the attempt by people to hijack and thwart government’s effort at reaching out to the elderly citizens through the ARISE Elders Initiative.
Pastor Umo Eno who bared his mind recently, at the April edition of the Government House monthly prayer service held at the Latter House Chapel, Governor’s Lodge, Uyo, stressed that the ARISE Elders Initiative was not a PDP project meant for the PDP members alone, but for the entire Akwa Ibom people.
Eno noted that the selection of beneficiaries was also, not meant for an individual stakeholder, but a collective arrangements among stakeholders in each ward across the State.
According to him, each month, local government areas provide at least 15 elderly people to government to help them with their medications, as a lot of them die due to lack of medical attention.
He explained that each month government support each beneficiary with N50, 000, adding that though It is government initiative for the elderly, complaints of the hijack of the process by some people, have been recieved by government.
Eno stressed the need for people to allow the process to run smoothly, as one person cannot bring fifteen people, noting that it is not wrong for a local government chairman to liase with the paramount ruler, to do the selection, which he stressed, should comprise old men and women across the wards.
” It is not supposed to be a PDP thing. Government programmes are not meant for PDP members alone, It is meant for everybody. It should benefit everyone.
So please, select old men and women across the wards, let them come and get the money. Recreational activities are also organised during the meeting so that they can go home with joy in their hearts. So please, I ask that the coordinator should bring people together and not just deal with only one family. We mean well for our people and they should benefit from these programmes”.
The governor who frowned at the vandalisation of government’s facilities in the state, charged stakeholders across the State to protect public facilities in their domains against vandalism, as government will not continue to invest resources on such facilities.
He noted that government is making efforts to touch all communities in the State, and that going to replace vandalized facilities in some communities while others were yet to have one, would no longer be tolerated.
Eno who specifically mentioned the electricity transformers provided communities in the State, said “there is so much request for transformers and I want to appeal that there are communities that transformers were already given. I know the last administration bought well over two hundred transformers, they distributed these transformers, and fixed them but people have vandalized some
People live in these communities, so when government brings transformer to your community and you cannot watch it or set up a system to protect it, and they are vandalized and you come again, understand that we have many communities in this state, and would not replace newly-installed transformers if the people there don’t know the value of transformers”.
The state chief executive officer advocated for the formation of a neighborhood watch or vigilante in communities to protect the transformers and other government assets around them, as these facilities belong to everyone, hence, the need for them to be interested in them.
He advised the citizenry to take their security seriously, as recent happenings in the State have shown that from everyone kidnapped in the State, 20 per cent is by chance and 80 per cent is information from people around the victim.
Eno enjoined everyone to minimize the publication of personal information on the social media as such constitutes security risk.
He made known that his first anniversary was drawing closer and the list of projects that would be commissioned will soon be made public, and appealed to the stakeholders to endeavour to participate in the anniversary activities.
“A lot of people are asking us, what is your legacy project? For me, our legacy project is rural development. Everybody has his own style. The current reality demands that we do soft infrastructure, I call them soft infrastructure because you can do those hard ones and before people will use them, they are dead.
That is not to say that we won’t do what we wanted to do. As we step into the second year, we are stepping up on what we wanted to do in line with our ARISE Agenda”.
The governor appreciated the guest minister, Reverend Emmanuel Iniama, who is the Senior Pastor of Precious Faith Int’l Church, for his message, and all the attendees for being part of the service.
Ministering on the theme, “deliverance from wicked and unreasonable men”, with text taken from 2 Thessalonians 3:2, Reverend Emmanuel Iniama, observed that wicked and unreasonable men are everywhere and that through prayers, discernment, fasting and training can one be delivered from them.
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