EBBC DG, Tony Nwizi Says Nwifuru Is Fufilling The People’s Charter of Needs Manifesto
By Alex Odeh
The Director General of Ebonyi State Broadcasting Corporation, Chief Tony Nwizi, has disclosed that Governor Francis Nwifuru was holistically fufilling on the People’s Charter of Needs mantra that defined the Nwifuru-led administration.
Nwizi disclosed this, Thursday in his office in Abakaliki while interacting with journalists.
The Director General recalled that the People’s Charter of Needs which encapsulated the campaign manifesto of the Nwifuru’s administration was designed to address the actual needs of Ebonyi people and to ameliorate their sufferings.
He explained that Governor Francis Nwifuru had through the People’s Charter of Needs agenda addressed the needs of Ebonyi people in areas such as the payment of backlog of pensions and gratuities to pensioners who left the service since 1996.
He said, “First of all, he started with settling the arrears of gratuities of pensioners from 1996 that have been packed and packed. You know previous government did nothing about it. And he paid a whopping sum of four billion naira, he started with that, to settle the arrears of pensions and gratuities of state civil servants.
“When it happened, people were like, there were people who were in the hospital and submitted their details and they got alert while in the hospital bed, and got well automatically.
“They saw money that they had not seen all through their service years until they were old to that extent. And they saw money, they were paid in full, arrears of money since 1996. They were given very serious uplifts in their life.
He further stated that the administration of Nwifuru had also revamped the education,health, agricultural sectors and restored peace in communities that were bedeviled with crisis before he assumed office.
Nwizi said, “First of all, he split the education sector into two, primary and secondary, and then tertiary. So, under primary and secondary, he started with building structures in the schools. And those structures he built in the schools were to bring back glory of schools.
“To prepare for a better condition, better environmental condition for pupils and the students of secondary schools. And he started with buildings. He selected some schools and started with”, he said.
In the health sector, he revealed that the governor had made available the need facilities for medical personnel to discharge their duties without any hitches.
The DG said, “Some doctors complain they are dumped into the hinterlands, they don’t even have means of attending to some other things in the town, but they have vehicles to take them anywhere they want to go. And that is empowerment to the doctors. Not just empowerment, it makes things easier for them to be able to take care of the people health-wise.
“So, he provided SUVs to all the doctors managing the general hospitals to make sure that they do not tamper with the ambulances to avoid that at a particular time that there is an emergency, that the ambulance was not there to take up the emergency.
“He provided ambulances to all the hospitals. And those ambulances are brand new 2023 model of HIAS buses, Toyota HIAS buses, which was in perfect condition to take any sick person to anywhere without hindrance.
“He increased their salaries and also provided allowances, hazard allowances, to all the doctors. I will not mention the figures, you already know it. So, he provided hazard allowances to the doctors and then increased their salaries.
“He didn’t end there, he recruited doctors and paramedics to man the hospitals in the entire state. And all those things are money. They are money.
“And so, all those things he did in the health sector were what was good for the people in the hinterlands, because that’s what they need, healthcare. And he is doing it. So, that one for under-healthcare.
He noted that under agriculture, a lot of revolution had taken place with the revitalization of the hatchery and the total reactivation of the Ezillo farm.
There is also a committee, a board, called Agricultural Land Acquisition Board, or I think it’s a board, that go about looking for land, empty land, that government can cultivate.
“He revitalised the hatchery, the Ebonyi State hatchery that had gone comatose. He also opened a feed mill. Feed mill. For not just the hatchery, but for others to also come and get their feed for their private livestock, and those who have private poultry and livestock, and those into animal husbandry. So, and a lot of things.
“If you pass through Ezillo Farm, you see how green it is, because it has been adequately cultivated. And so, they provide seedlings, provide fertilisers, because we have a functional fertiliser blending plant, and other things that make farmers strive in producing food to reduce hunger in the centre. So, he has done a lot in the agricultural sector”, he noted.
Nwizi, however, commended Governor Francis Nwifuru for addressing protracted communal crisis in the state, saying that a lot of crisis had rocked the state.
“Number one, all the areas of conflict areas that we had before this administration, the governor delved into it, and quelled all the problems. You talk about Abomege/Ishinkwo, you talk about Effium and Ezza-Effium
“There are a lot of conflict areas. Before His Excellency came on board, but since he came, he started looking into their problems, stepping into the creeks with his legs, not just sitting in the comfort of his office to issue orders”, he concluded.
