The wife of Governor of Anambra State, Her Excellency, Dr. (Mrs.) Ebelechukwu Obiano (Osodieme) recently concluded a twelve day annual tour of the twenty-one Local Government Areas of the state and her main focus was to advocate meaningful engagement for women.

 

While concluding the tour, She emphasized the imperative of women being meaningfully engaged to be able to provide the much needed help to their husbands running the home economy.

The First lady while addressing the indigiens said that she came as a messenger of goodwill with the permission of her husband, the Governor of Anambra State, Chief Willie Obiano, who in appreciation of the importance of multiple channeled self-assessments in governance sent her to feel their pulse and revert to him.

Addressing Anambra people at each leg of the tour, Osodieme said that the unique feedback mechanism would help the Obiano administration to improve the lot of the people.

The Annual Community/Local Government Tour which is essentially designed for advocacy and empowerment outreach to the less privileged, especially indigent widows, persons with disabilities, orphans and vulnerable children and the aged is in collaboration with the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs. The 2019 edition was very unique.

 

It did not just provide Osodieme and Anambra people (particularly women) a platform for interaction as feedback to the government but availed Her Excellency the opportunity of instructing many who turned up at the respective Local Government Area headquarters on how to enhance their lives and improve society.

Osodieme did not hesitate to offer willing women and youths opportunities to be trained and empowered free of charge under her NGO, Caring Family Enhancement Initiative (CAFÉ), in any field of micro enterprise with free start-up capital and enabling equipment: just as it was with the over 4,600 earlier beneficiaries.

 

She also conveyed the Governor’s promise of other empowerment opportunities following his push to attract N3.5bn facility from the Central Bank of Nigeria for various agriculture ventures with 60% reserved for women.

Osodieme, stating that ‘health is wealth,’ called on the rich to help offset the cost of healthcare for the poor by taking advantage of the Anambra State Health Insurance Scheme.

 

She announced that the annual registration fee per person for the healthcare services in approved hospitals across the state is N12,500.

 

The efficacy of Osodieme’s health advocacy during the tour was extolled by the Executive Secretary of Anambra State Health Insurance Agency (ASHIA), Dr Simeon Onyemechi, who described the Governor’s wife as a frontline ASHIA Ambassador.