Drive for peace and priority for workers welfare have been identified as the reasons behind the achievements recorded by Governor of Enugu State, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, this was the assertion of the Deputy Minority Leader of the House of Representatives,Hon. Toby Okechukwu.


Hon Toby who represents Aninri/Awgu/Oji River at the green chambers made this known in a recent interview, according to Toby, Gov. Ugwuanyi's determination to ensure peace in the coal city state created the enabling environment for commercial and other economic activities to thrive in the state. He adjoined the state Governor's commitment to worker's welfare which includes the prompt payment of salaries as part of the reasons for the Governor's sterling performance in the state.


In his words :" Enugu state is first and foremost, is a PDP state which is good and we have also had good governors. The magic of what inspires the Governor is his drive for peace and you can see that in Enugu if you say peace it is not good, go and check violence."


He continued " The beauty of peace we have in Enugu is that it enables the governor to perform. Peace guarantees a climate environment where people want to come to the state to carry out their various economic activities and whatever he/she does at least they are certain that it is safe and when citizens are aware their properties are safe it will aid the government to perform better.


On workers welfare and infrastructure; he said: "Aside from the Governor's infrastructural interventions and strides, if you check the judiciary he has transformed them. The state schools have gotten attention, even in the road sector. He is a Governor that is focused on education. The prompt payment of salaries is a top priority for him, though the Governor has expressed the view that should not be praised for paying salaries, that it was what he was elected to do.What the Governor should be commended for is the payment of 13 months salary to the workers that is, giving them extra month pay in a year during December. So he has done well in creating a healthy environment in the state.


On his achievements as House a member of the lower parliament Toby enumerated his Youth empowerment programmes in the areas of Agriculture. He mentioned that asides making laws, the need to get the youths meaningful engaged were among his priorities.


He said " Our aspiration is to represent and to make laws that will get the youths usefully engaged. Recently; we trained over fifty people in "Aquaculture" and established a demonstration farm where they can practice and have a gestation period of six months . We also trained them on how to make feeds and how to fertilize fish eggs ; they taught the entire value chain of fish production.


We also invited special trainers from the Federal College of marine technology from Lagos and trained them for about a week. We also got them exposed to opportunities for funding like the Central Bank funding , Anchor borrowing. These areas we have been working on in terms of empowering the people. I have since realised that you can't dash people out of poverty, you can't dash people free money and bring them out of poverty, he concluded.

https://thenigeriadaily.com/2020/12/01/why-ugwuanyi-has-excelled-as-enugu-governor-reps-deputy-minority-leader-hon-toby/