New Year: Kogi making consistent progress towards sustainable, verifiable, replicable results

… says 2021 was a watershed for physical, engineering development

Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello has noted that the state under his leadership has made consistent progress towards sustainable, verifiable, replicable results in the last six years, noting that every year the state have reached for new altitudes in governance and established fresh attitudes in leadership in pursuit of their electoral promises.

The Governor made this known on Saturday in his New Year broadcast where he noted that his administration’s best value was putting the people and their priorities as topmost agenda.

He said “In our effort to do more of this we made Education, Health, Infrastructure and Utilities, Job Creation and Youth Engagement, Civil Service and Pension Reforms, Agriculture, Security, as well as Cooperation and Integration among all Nigerians in our state our expanded thematic focus in this second term”.

Governor Bello continued that his administration has been spectacularly and successfully busy in the health sector, way beyond Covid-19 noting that that in its constructed, renovated or equipped hundreds of Primary Healthcare Centres across the state, with a good number of them fitted with solar lighting facilities to ensure that they can operate by day and by night, in its first term.

According to the governor, in his second term the administration have been upgrading secondary and tertiary healthcare infrastructure across Kogi State stating that some of the enduring legacy efforts in this area include the construction of a 300-bed Reference Hospital in Okene which when completed it will have ultramodern equipment for diagnosis and treatment of most diseases occurring in our society.

“We are also renovating and remodeling the Specialist Hospital, Lokoja including the construction of a brand new administrative block. At the same time we are building brand new General Hospitals in Badoko, Ajaokuta LGA and Gegu Beki in Kogi LGA.

We are also constructing a new clinical complex in Prince Abubakar Audu University Teaching Hospital, Anyigba as we rush to start a medical programme in the school” he pointed out.

Governor Bello mentioned that his government was also constructing an advanced clinical complex in the General Hospital, Isanlu simultaneously with comprehensive overhauls of the Zonal Hospital Idah and Adavi Eba Cottage Hospital.

He stressed that his government was not talking covid for lack of any other achievement, but as a necessary corollary to all they were doimg to secure the healthcare and wellbeing of the people of Kogi State.

In addition to achievements in the health sector the governor ascertained that the government made great progress in the development of infrastructure and utilities in all constituencies of the State.

According to him, on the 23rd of October, 2021 the government completed work on the 55km Anyigba – Ejule – Umomi – Ugwolawo – Ajaka – Idah road in the Eastern Senatorial District. It joins the Ganaja Flyover and Interchange, the Ankpa, Lokoja, Okene and Kabba Township roads, along with many other road and projects across all sectors in the 3 Senatorial zones, to bear eloquent testimony that 2021 was indeed a watershed year for physical and engineering development in Kogi State.

“In 2021 the Confluence University of Science and Technology, Osara held her first matriculation – less than one year after we established it from scratch. We had earlier secured full accreditation for our School of Nursing at Obangede. In 2021, the College of Health Sciences and Technology, Idah also held its Convocation with all courses fully accredited by the various regulators – for the very first time after four and a half decades of existence.

“In the same year 2021 the Prince Abubakar Audu University, Anyigba was among a cohort of only 25 private, state and federal universities in Nigeria to receive full accreditation from the National Universities Commission (NUC) for all courses offered. This is an educational milestone that the bulk of the 170 universities in Nigeria are yet to achieve including some which are many decades old, he submitted.

The Governor asserted that these achievements were proof of its ability to confront difficult times and situations with foresight and courage in fulfilment of the administration’s resolve and promise to ensure accelerated and proportional development of the State during his tenure.