1 ½ Years in office: Hon. Isa Umar writes his achievements to Lokoja constituents.
By Abbas Yahaya
The membe representing the people of Lokoja | constituency in the kogi state house of Assembly, Hon Isa Umar has given a report card of his representation of his constituent
for his ½ years in legislative office and has taken to his Facebook page to notify constituents of his achievements since he was elected into the House.
This content was obtained from his facebook page, read what he said below;
“As for what I have been able to achieve for the people of Lokoja | constituency, it may not be possible to list all of them here.
To start with, I will say I have done the best I can as a member of the house of assembly within my 1 and half years and talking about my activities as a member.
I want to say that every legislator has three cardinal responsibilities, one is the act of law making, that is through motions and bills and I want to say that I have done brilliantly well in that regard.
Secondly, the core responsibility of a house member has to do with representation. This is to ensure that your constituency gets fair representation. In this regard, I have also done brilliantly well because I have attracted some developments to my constituency. I have also helped in terms of employments into state Ministries, Departments and Agencies of government.
The third responsibility has to do with oversight functions at the committee level and in that regard I have also done greatly well but more importantly one will say there is room for improvement at all levels.
With the little time I spent in office, I have been able to achieve the following with your prayers and support;
EDUCATION |
As part of my campaign promises before being elected their are over 150 students from Lokoja | constituency who benefitted from my NECO scholarship scheme.
I have identified Education as the best legacy one can leave for the younger generations to have a brighter future. Education is the best gift that could prepare our teaming youths to face our societal challenges and change our constituency and nation for the better. I believe in quality education beyond everything and I accord a high priority in educating my constituents.
EDUCATION ||
Earlier this year, I notice that there are a lot of out of school children in our communities, therefore, I decided to come up with an education support programme to reduce the challenges. I targeted 1000 out of school children to be enrolled in various primary schools in Lokoja. We have already started with 200 pupils who are orphans and the less privileged children.
Through the ‘Young Shall Grow’ association, I enrolled the children from less privileged homes, who were out of school because of the poverty level of their parents into various schools across the political wards of this constituency. The children are now enrolled into various public primary schools across lokoja local Government areas.
So far, we enrolled 220 pupils and provided each pupil with school uniform and writing materials. The gesture is part of my commitment to complement state government efforts to reduce the number of out of school children in the state. I am excited at the opportunity to make a difference together again; to educate, empower and meet the basic needs of street children where they need us the most.
I have also procured 28 admission forms from various tertiary institutions within and outside the state for secondary schools leavers of Lokoja | constituency willing to further their education. We are going to sponsor all the successful candidates that get admission in the institutions up to the conclusion of their programmes.
SOCIAL SERVICE
Worried by the urgent need to ameliorate the social and economic hardships many people in our communities are experiencing as a result of the status quo, with the support of my fellow government officials, I provided palliatives for vulnerable families in my constituency. I made a donation of over 500 bags of 5kg rice, Semovita and cantons of Indomie, Macaroni and Sugar which has been distributed to most vulnerable families in Iokoja | Constituency.
For efficient and immediate distribution of the items, I constituted a monitoring team, selected from each of the 5 wards of the Lokoja | constituency, I mandated them to ensure that the items are distributed strictly and only to families who are in dire need of them.
The items were evenly distributed to recipients in each community according to the following criteria:
1. To the very sick, blind or physically challenged.
2. To the very economically challenged.
3. To the very aged who are not adequately cared for.
The monitoring team for each ward firstly reported to the ward head of the respective community that assisted them in nominating names of the most vulnerable to the monitoring team that enable them reach out to them. It is true that nothing we do at this time may be enough, but the little we do would go a long way to ameliorate the economic hardships recently facing which will cause for these families, as most of them depend on a daily income to feed, which is now being cut shut by circumstance.
EMPOWERMENT
There is a common adage which says, “I will teach you how to catch fish, rather than give you fish”. This has been done in furtherance to my campaign promise and personal resolve to create wealth and expand opportunities especially to youths and women in Lokoja | constituency.
I enrolled and empower 50 constituents through the Kogi Union of Tailors (KUT) for the National Business and Technical Examination Board.
They have successfully completed the course and certificates have been issued to the beneficiaries with tokens as starting pack, mostly on fashion designers in Ladies garments making and Men’s garment making, which cut across Lokoja | and || without discrimination after an intensive exam and training aimed at upgrading their production and technical capacities.
I was delighted that the seed we planted has grown. It was meant to upgrade the capacities of the targeted beneficiaries for them to be more productive and self reliant.
During the presentation of the certificates, I urged the beneficiaries to ensure optimum utilisation of the learning so as to serve its intended purpose and objectives and see their selection for this benefit as a unique opportunity to develop themselves and be self productive and reliance.
This is in fulfillment of the promises to my people during the electioneering to always interact with them, share in their difficulties and challenges and above all to be alive to their yearnings and aspirations at all time
SOCIAL SERVICE ||
I received many complaints regarding inadequate water supply in some part of Lokoja due to damages of pipes. As such, I paid the sum of (N100,000) one hundred thousand naira for the repair of Newlayout pipe borne water and replicate the same in other wards of lokoja
During the visitation of some of my constituents, I disclosed to the youths some of my plans to tackle the problem of water supply across not just Newlayout but Lokoja local government, which includes the deliberation with staffs of Lokoja water board and the establishment of a larger reservoir at the famous Mount Patti. Apart from the (N100,000) one hundred thousand paid, I supported the various group with, the sum of Ten thousand naira (N10000) for the opening of the association bank account. I also assure them of the recent ongoing recruitment of Nigeria Navy and National Drug Law Enforcement Agency and others, I will make efforts within my capacity to see that the youths of Lokoja are adequately shortlisted.p
HEALTHCARE
1. As the chairman House committee on Healthcare Services, I swing into action and called on doctors at the hospital, the hospital’s management and the federal government to expedite actions to reopen the hospital. While the hospital remains shut, it has taken a toll on the health workers and patients who need specialised care.
The good people of lokoja who are the host community of the hospital and entire Kogi state were actually suffering due to the closure of the hospital for over three months. The hope, the patients have is to seek alternative healthcare until the authorities do what is needed for the hospital to reopen. My intervention as the chairman house committee on healthcare led to the suspension of the shut down of the Federal Medical Centre, Lokoja.
2. The passed clause in the 2020 Appropriation Bill that will ensure that 1% of the CR is used to establish a Basic Healthcare Fund. This will provide access to primary healthcare for ALL kogites.
3. Distribution of token amount to catered for challenge of Covid-19 Pandemic
4. Procurement of five thousand sanitizers and (5,000) face mask for the people of Lokoja |
5. Influencing the recruitment of causal health workers and
Sustained payment of Traditional birth attendance.
7. Provision and distribution of hand sanitizers, including Veronica’s buckets, personal thermometers for prevention and control of covid-19.
Thank you for voting for me, without your support and prayers I will never be in the kogi state house of assembly to represent you, I am grateful. Aside this, I implore you to to follow me on this page and see several motions and bills I have moved touching the lives of Kogites and Lokoja | Constituency.
Fellow constituents, I am only doing the work you sent me to do, which is to represent you, and I have done that very well, I have won several accolades due to my legislative abilities on the floor of the house, arguing and standing up for whatever would benefit the people.
These and many more are made possible by your support vote and prayers. I therefore implore my people to continue to support me, work with me, feel free to call me up whenever there are issues of urgent attention because I am here for you, to serve you and above all to ensure that lives in our great constituency is better.
My constituency office is always open to the general public, I pick my calls personally. Feel free to reach out to me anytime there are issues of urgent attention.
I implore you to also take time to go through the pictures which are evidence of my various programs in my 1 and half years in office.
Thank you All.”
However, Hon. Isa Umar’s wonderful write-up in the eyes of his constituents and other readers will definitely generate applauds but one thing is sacrosanct, more work needs to be done in every community under Lokoja | Constituency.