Do Not Underestimate Community Influence In Development Of PHCs - Executive Sec.

ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) which are directly and indirectly involved in the airport development.

The Ministry of Works, for example, is building roads and bridges, among others, leading to the airport and within the airport. It may cost about fifty million dollars ($50m) to complete the first phase of this grand airport which is in a class of its own. In other words, it is nothing near the almost one trillion naira AASA which the political propagandists who hate Anambra State with a passion are bandying about. They will leave nothing to chance in the determination to discredit the state and ruin the homeland of Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe, Dr Alex Ekwueme, Dim Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, Francis Cardinal Arinze, Professor K.O. Dike, Professor Chinua Achebe, Dr Nwafor Orizu, Sir Louis Ojukwu, Olauda Equiano, Professor Chukwuemeka Ike, Professor Laz Ekwueme, Professor Ben Enweonwu, Professor Uche Okeke, Dr Arthur Nwankwo, Cyprian Ekwensi, Blessed Cyprian Michael Iwene Tansi, Professor Chike Obi, Professor Alex Animalu, Professor Ben Obumselu, Professor Emmanuel Obiechina, Mokwugo Okoye, Sir Louis Mbanefo, Professor Gordian Ezekwe, Chief Arthur Mbanefo, Professor Ben Nwabueze, Professor Charles Chukwuma Soludo, Mrs Oby Ezekwesili, Professor Dora Akunyili, Mrs Janet Muokelu, Chief Jerome Udoji, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and many other world-class achievers.

The State Government has made it an article of faith to limit expenditures to budgetary provisions. The result is the humongous fiscal discipline which has enabled the state to carry out projects and programmes which, as the Joint National Assembly Committee on Aviation publicly stated during its inspection of Anambra International Cargo/Passenger Airport on March 27, 2021, even richer states like petroleum-bearing ones are unable to execute.

No wonder, on August 31, 2020, BudGIT, funded by the Melinda and

Bill Gates Foundation, published a report showing Anambra and petroleum-rich Rivers State have the best fiscal responsibility indices of all 36 states in Nigeria plus the Federal Capital Territory of Abuja.

If not for the prudent financial management of the state’s lean resources, the airport could have cost two billion dollars ($2bn). Maybe this is the amount which would have been expended on it if the project had been handled by the shadowy politicians whom the great Chinua Achebe most memorably described as “renegades who want to turn my homeland of Anambra State into a bankrupt and wretched fiefdom’’.

The Government and people of Anambra State are delighted that the delivery of Anambra International Cargo/Passenger Airport has been attracting the attention of not just the Nigerian public or the aviation sector or the tourism industry but also leading researchers in financial management, project management and related disciplines.

Gov. Willie Obiano, by building a world-class international airport in 15 months and without borrowing from any financial institution, has demonstrated, once again, his solid background in banking, auditing, accounting, business management and political leadership. The airport will certainly make a rewarding study in prudent management.

Nigeria - Executive Secretary, Anambra State Primary Healthcare Development Agency (ASPHCDA), Dr Chioma Ezenyimulu has urged communities not to underestimate its power in the development of Primary Healthcare Centres (PHCs) in their communities.

The Agency, also, works hand in hand with these communities to ensure development of PHCs too. Dr Ezenyimulu said this when a team from the Civil Society Network, Anambra chapter led by Prince Chris Azor paid her a courtesy visit at the ASPHCDA office complex, Awka. According to the executive secretary, primary healthcare is carried out in communities in the spirit of self determination and self reliance.

This is part of the Alma ata declaration of 1978 on Primary Healthcare which is its bedrock.

She noted that the Agency was doing all it could to ensure that every ward in the state had a functional PHC, especially in terms of drug availability.

She expressed delight as the state had been given approval for the remaining 156 health facilities for one PHC per ward to come on board in the Basic Healthcare Provision Fund (BHCPF).

BHCPF is a per cent of the consolidated revenue of the federation mapped out for development of PHCs across the country.

“Anambra started off with 176 facilities out of 332 wards in the state for BHCPF and having applied the funds judiciously, approval has been given for the remaining 156 facilities. “This means that every political ward in the state now has a functional