• Wants FG’s intervention in two dilapidated federal highways
Enugu State Governor, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, has pledged to support the Nigerian Army to rekindle the interest of the people of the state in military service.

He said his government would, henceforth, get involved in the recruitment exercise by mobilising and stimulating interest among youths. The governor, therefore, directed those interested to liaise with their council chairmen for appropriate action.

He stated this while conducting officials of the Nigerian Army, sent to Enugu to sensitise the people to mitigate apathy in enlistment and under representation in the army. The governor stressed that it is an aberration that within the last two recruitment exercises by the army, Enugu had not met its quota.

He said: “We want a situation whereby people of the state will be part of leadership in the military so that there could be a sense of belonging and fulfillment.”

Speaking through his Special Adviser on Information, Steve Oruruo, the governor decried a situation where Enugu was underrepresented in the military.

He noted: “Even if marginalisation had been established against us, it would be illogical, infantile, self-defeatist and a self-inflicted retrogression to abandon our quota, especially when we still invite the military in the face of mutating and multifarious security threats.

Ugwuanyi noted that the officials of the Nigerian Army are scheduled to interact with the people in the state capital, but stressed that he decided to sponsor the interface in the three senatorial zones of Enugu North, Enugu West and Enugu East, because of the importance of communicating the message to the grassroots.

MEANWHILE, appealing to the Federal Government to urgently take steps to, at least, effect repair works on the 9th Mile-Opi Junction section of the Enugu-Makurdi expressway and the 9th Mile-Opi Junction old road, which are in deplorable conditions, the Ugwuanyi administration has opted to carry out remedial works on the two federal roads in the interim, while awaiting intervention of the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing.

A statement by the Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure, Greg Nnaji, disclosed that “the State Executive Council, in its last meeting, conscious of difficulties arising from dilapidated roads in the state, set up a technical team to visit the axis with a view to identifying critical failed sections, and report findings for palliative measures aimed at immediate safe passage, especially for petroleum products laden articulated vehicles, which, if not done, may negatively impact on the availability of these essential products in the state and its environs.”