From Dom Ekpunobi, Onitsha

It was a day of joy for the people of Umuoji in Anambra State as they received free medical service from a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO), Good Living Initiative, which has been assisting  rural dwellers to receive medical attention without hindrance.

A unique day of special occasion as they gathered in their to

Announcements were made on two consecutive days in the town for the people to come out to Amoji Village Hall, Umuoji venue of the programme for the gesture.

Although the programme was officially scheduled to start at 10:00a.m that Monday, but many of the people were already at the venue as early as 8:00a.m.

Luckily, officials of Good Living Initiative and their medical team were also there early enough and when they saw that a crowd had gathered even much earlier than scheduled, they started attending to them in order to reduce the burden of the people having to wait for longer period.

Attendance at the occasion cut accross age and sex barriers as the old, young, youths and children came out in their large numbers.

On the whole, not less than 2,000 people were attended to by the medical team.

Besides receiving treatment, each of them received on medicated mosquito net.

On the whole, there were more 10 medical doctors and other medical personnel led by Dr Nnabueze who incidentally was the chairman of the medical committee set up by the Umuoji Improvement Union, Lagos branch.

Dr Nnabueze along with the other medical personnel travelled from Lagos to Umuoji to discharge that responsibility to his community.

In addition to assisting in ensuring the success of the day’s programme, Dr Nnabueze gave them lecture on High Blood Presure, Diabities, HIV and Malaria, their causes and symtoms.

Speaking on the occasion, the Executive Director of Good Living Initiative, Mrs Suzzy Metuh, who was accompanied to the event by her husband, said that her organization decided to take the programme to Umuoji in order to enable the community benefit from the service which they had taken to various places in Nigeria.

Mrs Mutuh who expressed delight at the massive turnout by the people for the free-medical service said she was moved to introduce it in Umuoji in order to ameliorate the plight of those who could not easily access medical services as a result of cost or other factors.

She noted with dismay that a lot of people often die because their ailments were not dictated early enough until they attained dangerous levels.

She advised the people to always seek medical attention and go for routen checks in order to ascertain their fitness or orderwise, and promised that she would make the free medical test more regular.

Also speaking, the Anambra State Cordinator of Global Form Malaria, Society for Family Health, Mr Chukwuzoba Obinna, commended the management of Good Living Initiative for drawing their kind gesture to Umuoji people.

He also advised the people to always have regular medical check-up in order to ascertain their health status.

The councillor representing Umuoji ward in Idemili North LGA, Hon Vincent Okagwu, expressed gratitude to the organizer of the programme which he said was the first of its kind in many years.

He appealed to the sponsor of the programme to make it more regular in the overall interest of the people.

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Imo First Lady builds skills acquisition centre for youths

From George Onyejiuwa, Owerri

An old adage says if you give a man fish you have fed him for a day, but if you teach a man how to fish you have succeeded in feeding him for a life time.

Indeed, this adage demonstrated the gesture of the  Imo State First Lady, Mrs Nkechi Rochas Okorocha, who established  skills acquisition centre not only  to help the teeming unemployed youths in the state to acquire useful skills, but to also help stem the rising tide of unemployment in the state.

While the Orlu Skills Centre was commissioned recently with 120 youths as pioneer students, the two other centres in Owerri and Okigiwe senatorial zones are close to completion.

The well equipped centre which also has a cottage industry and a 300 seating capacity civic hall is to provide free training in catering, photography, fashion and designing, computer training, cosmetology and hair dressing.

Speaking at the official launching and matriculation of the pioneer students of the skills acquisition centre in Orlu which was witnessed by prominent natives of the state, including top government officials, Mrs Okorocha said the centre was purposely established to reduce the high rate of unemployment amongst the youths by providing them with free skills acquisition as a way of complementing the efforts of the state government on job creation. 

Her words: “I established the centre for the purpose of skills acquisition and economic empowerment. My target is that in no distant time, the students would become self-reliant, independent and great entrepreneurs of repute who I believe would become employers of labour.

“I hope to build more centres and to expand the existing ones in order to empower a great number of people and I call people of goodwill to support this initiative”.

She also disclosed that they would be collaborating with the Imo State Polytechnic in its training which would also afford those who are willing to advance their studies.

Similarly, the Imo State governor, Owelle Rochas Okorocha who was represented by his Deputy, Prince Eze Madumere, said that the establishment of the skills acquisition centres in the three senatorial zones of the state was the right step in the right direction, especially now that the nation’s economy was going through a rough patch.

“We need to provide a more practical education that will guarantee jobs for our teeming unemployed graduates. Education alone is not just preparation for life, but it is life itself. The best form of education is that which allows one to develop the talent inside, thereby making oneself self-reliant,” he said. 

Also speaking, the Deputy Chief of Staff (Operation) Government House, Mr Kingsley Uju, who applauded the initiative by the First Lady, said that the skills acquisition centre would offer the youths of the entire Orlu a new lease of life by their acquiring useful and life-long skills at no cost.

“I must commend the wife of the governor for this initiative by building a free skills acquisition centre for the zone,” he said, adding that scheme would make them become self-reliant and empower them at no cost to themselves or their parents.

Some of the students who spoke to Oriental News expressed gratitude to the First Lady for establishing the centre, which they said have given them the opportunity to acquire skills for free which ordinarily would have been financially tasking for their parents were it to be a private training centre.

According to Enwerem Hannah Okwuchukwu who enrolled for computer training thanked Mrs Okorocha for making it easy for those of them from very humble background to get free training in whatever skills that the youths in the zone wanted.

“But for this centre I would not have started this computer training which is what I always wanted to do, but because it is very expensive, but I thank God and I’m grateful to Nneoma Okorocha.

Also, Unaegbu Esther Uzoamaka, a catering student, said “help me thank Her Excellency Nneoma Nkechi Okorocha to help me realize my dream of being a caterer and for free of charge”.

Highlight of the events was the inspection of some of the products like liquid soaps, dettol, cakes, cloths, beads produced by the pioneer students of the centre.