Visiting underprivileged is good but we should expect more from a governor.

I recommend he starts calling for a disability support programme for such people of Lagos state. He can study prototype programs in developed countries where NGOs are awarded contracts to provide care and support for these persons. Govt role would be to provide guidelines, policies and standard of care required as well as monitor their performance, and audit accounts. Funds come from special taxes and donations from the public and international agencies

It is a huge project, but the time to start is now!

Solozzo:

Visiting underprivileged is good but we should expect more from a governor.

I recommend he starts calling for a disability support programme for such people of Lagos state. He can study prototype programs in developed countries where NGOs are awarded contracts to provide care and support for these persons. Govt role would be to provide guidelines, policies and standard of care required as well as monitor their performance, and audit accounts. Funds come from special taxes and donations from the public and international agencies

It is a huge project, but the time to start is now!

You made a great point. I was glad when the state passed the firs statewide disability law and the Governor signed it just last week. It's one thing to talk about helping out, hang out with the kids and the less privilege, build new facilities for the underprivileged, it's another to put your money and laws where your mouth is and I'm so glad they are putting out state commitments and setting policies in place to effect the new changes starting from adjustments regarding how we design and build infrastructures to accommodate the state's psychically challenged and the underprivileged.

Laws is the foundation and building blocks of sane, rational and progressive societies. It warms my heart when the people we ask to look out for us make laws and efforts to protect and keep us safe, not the other way around elsewhere around the country especially Abuja.

Fashola Signs Two Bills On PPP And Disability Affairs Into Law
…Calls for collaboration of everyone to make the provisions of new Disability Affairs law achievable


Jun 24, 2011 - Lagos State Governor, Mr Babatunde Fashola (SAN) on Friday signed two bills on the establishment of the Office of Disability Affairs 2010 and the provision of an Office of Public Private Partnership (PPP) 2011 into law, calling for a collaboration of everyone including the media in making the provisions of the new Disability Affairs law achievable.

Governor Fashola who spoke at Lagos House, Ikeja explained that what is needed is to ensure that through constant engagement with everyone, the provisions of the new law are imbibed by all segments of the society.

Governor Fashola said contrary to the media war orchestrated by some people that the State Government had not hastened to sign the law, the bill was just being signed because it just got to his table.

"This is one of the best laws that we have. The beneficiaries should also understand our challenges. The solution to communication gaps is to seek information and not to run to the media. There should be restraints on all sides, constant engagement not aggravation. We do not have any problem with the idea behind the new law'', he emphasised.

The Governor said in terms of attention that have been paid to physically challenged people in Nigeria, the new law will challenge architects, engineers and policy makers more than before on the need to realise that the practice of yesterday will have to give way to more contemporary practices where it is ensured that no member of the society is left behind.

Governor Fashola added that before the new law, the State Government had issued several Executive Orders to change some of the existing institutional beliefs such as his directives that ramps be provided in all public buildings to mitigate power challenges and allow the able and disabled to climb floors.

"You will see an increasing number of walkways on roads we are building now. It is a deliberate policy to ensure that physically challenged people are separated from motorists when walking and also share the roads as shared assets. This law will compel us now to do a lot more to meet the challenge around us that nobody must be left behind'', the Governor said.

[b]The Governor also appealed to health workers to continue to intensify efforts in the area of immunisation and vaccination to eradicate polio and measles which can lead to blindness.

"We must reduce the number of people who are physically challenged and ensure that we promote the emergence of a human workforce that its capacity of physical limitation is reduced overtime'', the Governor added.

Governor Fashola also commended the State Ministry of Health for intensifying the limb deformity corrective programme which is aimed at reducing disability in people through corrective surgery.

The Governor, who cited several infrastructural facilities provided by the Government to aid the people but which have not been put to use by them, stressed that the new law will need collaboration of everybody after a careful planning process to organise and integrate.

"For example, with the issue of making a number of seats available for the disabled provided under the new law, we should realise that the seats will not appear automatically. The Ministry of Transport should work with our various franchise owners like BRT to get special buses with dedicated seats. We may also have to check our urban planning laws and also engage the Local Governments which manage the parks on the provisions of the new law'', Governor Fashola added.[/b]

The Lagos State Governor explained that governments are now coming to the realisation that Private Public Partnership is becoming a best practice as the private sector is the engine of growth and driver of the economy.

He said funds that were hitherto locked up in banks and not acting in productive ways are being brought into the public sphere by encouraging private individuals and corporations who have capital to venture and partner with government to provide social service.

"This is another means of funding budgetary commitment apart from direct allocation, borrowing, raising of taxes by Public Private Partnership (PPP), you can The Governor reiterated that Lagos State has demonstrated deep capacity for close PPP transactions over the last few years with its success in the Taxi model, the Waste management model, Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) model, Power sector model and security model.

"The bill will only give more teeth and direction to the operational capacity of the agency to bring on more versatility and institutionalise permanently this emerging global practice within our State'', he added.

Governor Fashola, who said the new PPP law is not the first to be enacted by the State, however said it repeals the former law on Private Sector Participation which has been amended severally and incorporated into the new law.

Speaking earlier while presenting the bill one of which he initiated as a private member's bill during the Sixth Legislative Assembly, the Majority Leader, Hon Ajibayo Adeyeye, said the new law on establishment of disability affairs law will safeguard those living with disability and equalise them with others.

He said part of the benefits provided by the new law that all public offices and buildings would be made accessible to disable people, adding that this must be achieved within the next five years.

Hon Adeyeye added that the law also prescribes that anyone who employs over a 100 people must include at least one disabled person, adding that every public bus service must reserve one seat out of every 10 available for passengers for a person with disability.

Hon Adeyeye also informed that one space out of every car lot in every car park must be reserved for a disabled person, adding that penalties are also prescribes for offenders under the law.

He informed that the Public Private Partnership law would regulate and formulate policies for private people seeking to provide public infrastructure.

"It also empowers the PPP to determine and charge tolls on such ventures. It will also ensure that users of such public infrastructures pay some form of users' fees to allow the investors recoup their funds", Hon Adeyeye added.

The Majority Leader explained that the law also prescribes penalties and punishments for organisations and individuals that seek to violate the provisions of the bill.

Prominent among those who witnessed the ceremony were the Deputy Governor, Hon (Mrs) Adejoke Orelope- Adefulire, Head of Service, Prince Adesegun Ogunlewe, the Body of Permanent Secretaries in the State Public Service and the Director General of the State PPP office, Mr Ayo Gbeleye.

kulutempa:


@Eko Ile, thank you very much.  I just get the feeling from reading the comments of some people on this thread and on Nairaland that our problems in Nigeria are not just down to our leaders.   A lot of our people are just downright sick and the word decency is alien to them.   Yes, it is true that Fashola did not have to visit those children, but the fact that he did shows that he is a kind, decent and thoughtful human being.   If only each and every one of our leaders  and ourselves did the same thing in our everyday lives, Nigeria would be a better place.   To some of the cynical and jeering fools on this thread I will leave you with the words of Jesus in Matthew 25:34-40

Then shall the King say to unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
For I was an hungred and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in:
unclothed, and  ye clothed me: I was sick and ye visited me:  I was in prison and ye came unto me.
Then the righteous shall answer him saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred and fed thee?  or thirsty and gave thee drink?
When we saw thee a stranger and took thee in? or unclothed and clothed thee?
Or when we saw thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee?
And the King shall answer and say unto them,  Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

Please remember these words when next you see a sick and disabled child, or a little boy or girl without shoes selling oranges on Eko bridge.  Thank you.

Very well said.

The fact is, the man made a pact with himself based on his own conscience to spend every birthday recognizing the less fortunate around him. The man's passion for his people and humanity in general goes way way beyond what's in the pictures I posted.

Nigerians generally have been so abused by bad leadership that they any trace of good leadership sounds abnormal and foreign to them, they are even skeptical about themselves too.


To show you that this man is real with his beliefs and personal commitment to the people he serve, read the article below. Back in 2009, he asked Nigerians not to send him and his government any advertorials, he told them to use such money to reach out to the needy in the state.

Fashola

On May 22, 2009 / By Imnakoya / In Governance, Nigeria

Lagos state governor, Babatunde Fashola has enjoined those wishing to place advertorials to congratulate his government to use such money to reach out to the needy in the state, according to media reports:

By way of celebration and congratulations, I think that anybody who truly feels that there is support to give to this government should do so by using the money for the adverts in a more judicious manner… helping us to reach those places we have not reached, near their homes and communities, schools where indigent children have only one set of uniforms, help them buy extra uniforms, police stations where they need generators and papers to do their work to protect all of us or use the money to support the police station nearer to you.

http://grandioseparlor.com/2009/05/no-advertorials-pls-gov-fashola/

Da Doctor:

PLEASE REMIND OUR FASHOLA THAT LAGOS IS DROWNING

APAPA OSHODI EXRESSWAY IS A NO GO AREA DESPITE ALL THE MUTIPLE TAXATION

Let him award the drainage to ALPHA BETA OR HITECH as usual

lmaooooooooooooooo


EKO ONI BAJE O!

And please tell your FG to hand over the road to him and lets see if he wont do some thing within months.

[b][size=16pt]Yeah, we should all clap for him and say, well done! Shall we??

Shame onto them all!  All along, they knew the right thing to do but chose/ignore to do so. God will judge them!

Imagine now, they realised we have disabled men, women and children up and down the country who have no one to care/support them in this tough/difficult life and thus, need our help.  Life is tough as it is, for a physically able person let alone, one with disability. 

Thanks to the Man of God at the Synagogue for showing the initiative and leadership to these evil men we have as rulers in this country, showing  that, what it's all about is, 'Doing good' and 'Doing the right thing' for this country and helping the poor, people with disability, widows and widowers in society - that's what it's about!   

It is not about, having Mansions in every city, driving the latest 4X4's, having your aeroplane parked at the tarmac of airports, stealing our money and hiding it away in the wholes in Switzerland, ok!

It about  doing good for mankind!   

For this gesture, I'll say to him and others contemplating this idea - thanks but, no thank!  It's a gesture, too late for for us to praise - stuff it! [/size][/b]

^Hehe, i cant fit laugh,