15th April, 2013
The Ogun State Government has spent about N3 billion on projects and programmes towards attaining the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) set by the United Nations.
The Special Adviser to the Governor on MDGs, Mrs. Hafsat Abiola-Costello, who disclosed this in Abeokuta, the state capital, said that the amount, half of which was provided by the Federal Government, was spent on health, education and sanitation schemes since 2008.
According to her, “projects implemented include the construction of sanitation facilities in some selected primary schools and Primary Health Centres (PHCs), construction of solar-powered
boreholes and distribution of mosquito insecticide nets through PHCs across the state.
“Others are the equipping of PHCs as well as capacity building of PHCs, local government staff and state planning officers,” she stated.
The MDGs, she explained, refer to eight goals aimed at alleviating poverty as set by the UN and agreed to by 190 countries, including Nigeria, in year 2000, adding that to ensure that the goals were met, “the Federal Government initiated the Conditional Grant Scheme, through which critically needed funds secured from the debt relief granted the country by the Paris Club in 2005 are channelled to collaborating states and local governments.”
On how the eight goals are being pursued in Ogun State, Abiola-Costello said, “in the area of health, the government has focused on goal four, five and six, which are reducing child mortality, improving maternal health and combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, respectively.”
On education, she said the government is successfully implementing the Universal Basic Education (UBE), which is goal two, while its efforts at ensuring environmental sustainability are in line with goal 7, which focuses on sanitation.
An innovation by the state government, she added, is the use of Conditional Cash Transfer to motivate poor pregnant women to access the health facilities for ante-natal care under a scheme called “Gbomoro.”
She stated that the project was earmarked for nine local government areas in the state and targeted at 5,000 pregnant women.
“Its impact is already being felt as women are now getting appropriate and timely care unlike what obtained in the past.
“On 26 March, just before the 1,000 days to the 2015 target date set for the attainment of the MDGs, a poor woman in Abeokuta South LGA was delivered of a baby girl through caesarian section, paid for through this scheme. Such was the gratitude of the parents that the baby was named Ibikunle, after the state governor.
“The story illustrates effectively the progress Ogun State is making toward fulfilling the National MDGs motto. Ogun State is surely putting people first,” Abiola-Costello added.
—Abiodun Onafuye/Abeokuta