Okowa Is Delivery On His 5-Point Agenda, Says CPS
The Chief Press Secretary (CPS), to the Delta State governor, Mr Charles Ehiedu Aniagwu, has insisted that the governor of the state, Senator (Dr) Ifeanyi Arthur Okowa, is delivery on the 5-Point Agenda he promised to Deltans during the electioneering year.
Okowa has his 5-Point Agenda encapsulated in his blueprint for the State with the acronym SMART, which means Strategic Wealth Creation Projects and Provision of Jobs for all Deltann, Meaningful Peace Building Platforms aimed at Political and Social Harmony, Agricultural Reforms and Accelerated Industrialisation, Relevant Health and Education Policies, Transformed Environment through Urban Renewal.
“What disturbs us now is for us to have the funds to deliver on the promises we made in the course of the 2015 electioneering campaign. Perhaps I will not call it disturbance, I will prefer to call it challenge. What we are concern about is how we are able to address those many promises we made and to the best of my knowledge by the grace of God, my boss Senator Dr Ifeanyi Arthur Okowa is as much as possible given the available resources delivery on the 5-Point Agenda”, Aniagwu said.
The CPS stated this Monday when he made his routine visit to the Indigenous Newspapers and Magazines Chapel (INMC) of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Delta State Council in Asaba.
He said the Relevant Wealth Creation which is based on the strategic policy the government is putting in place to create wealth, “we have been able to provide a number of jobs. But the jobs we are providing is not just the one you need to write application and begin to earn salary”, stressing that the jobs the state government is providing are to make those engaged in them employers of labour, “creating entrepreneurs who are on their own been able to also employ a lot of persons”.
He said the idea where newsmen pressurizes government to employ people when there are no vacancies does not show any form of development at this present dispensation, “trying to pressurise government to employ people when vacancies don’t exist does not bring about development. What bring development, is as much as possible creating the enabling environment. And that we are trying to do by providing roads that link up some communities so that those who are into certain forms of production will have access to the reasonable market. Being able to empower our brothers and sisters who have got talents to be able to move to the next level, because when we do that they will be able to employ more people and when they employ more people, it means that government has created more jobs”, he explained.
He noted that the state government was also doing well in the ‘Meaningful Peace Building’ which is also in collaboration with the federal government, “to a very reasonable extend bring about the cessation of hostilities in the creeks. That to a very large extent we encourage private investors to come into the state”.
“we are also very much concern about agricultural reforms, that we are doing either using YAGEP as a platform, getting our youths to be engaged in agriculture whether in terms of aquaculture, horticulture or any other thing that is involved in the agricultural sector in addition to proving tractors under the policy we call tractorization to our farmers to ensure that more persons are engaged”, adding that the state government has revamped existing educational institutions in both primary, secondary and tertiary institutions across the state.
He also noted that the state government was doing everything in its powers to elevate cottage hospitals in the state, “in addition to making sure that some other dispensaries and tertiary health facilities are also upgraded. We have also engaged a number of doctors to increase the number of medical personnel per patient”.
On the issue of ‘Transformed Environment through Urban Renewal’, the governor’s spokesperson said in the capital city, a good number of roads have been constructed even as he commended the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), that is assisting the state government to tackle a number of the street, “while we are also doing a number of the roads. So the intervention of NDDC have also enhanced the ecstatic value of the state capital, stressing that though the state has not gone to where it supposed to be “but have we left where we were as at a year or two ago? Yes, we have for those who want to be very objective”, he said.
He said major towns and urban centres across the state have witnessed upgrade of facilities, “and this is much more instructive and it is happening at a time when the resources at the disposal of different government is at its lowest ebb”, he added.