Agency sensitises Enugu communities on $20m CARES project

Ugwuanyi urges indigenes to invest at home
Enugu State Community and Social Development Agency (CSDA) has begun sensitisation in the 17 local councils of the state on the $20 million Nigeria COVID-19 Action Recovery/Economic Stimulus (NG-CARES) project.

NG-CARES, a Federal Government and World Bank project expected to commence in June this year, is a response to the COVID-19 crises. It is aimed at building projects in the communities that will help the citizens recover from the disastrous effect of the disease.

CSDA Chairman, Ibuchukwu Ezike, told stakeholders from the councils at a meeting yesterday that COVID-19 brought hardship on families and institutions, stressing that while businesses and institutions remained closed, nothing was working in most families.

He stated that the project would work in four major areas –health, water, education and nutrition, adding that failure of other interventions by the Federal Government elicited the joint intervention, to ensure that the right persons benefitted.

“The major objectives are to restore livelihood of the indigent population and the vulnerable and secondly, to recover and activate economic activities in Nigeria,” he said.

General Manager of CSDA, Mr. ThankGod Onoja, added: “The community has its role to play; the government has its role to play. The communities are the major stakeholders and own everything about the project. Ours is to facilitate, and that is the basis to enable them participate.”

IN another development, Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu has called on the indigenes to join in developing the state with their investments.

While declaring open the Easton Hill Continental Hotel, Independence Layout, Enugu, built by Chief Mike Onu open, the governor called on all illustrious sons and daughters of Enugu to think home in their investment decisions.

He reiterated his administration’s commitment to expansion of the frontiers of investment in the state, through sustained improvement in business-enabling environment.

According to the governor, the state has adequate stock of developable and arable land, robust physical infrastructure, willing youthful workforce, safe and secure environment, favourable policies, regulatory framework and friendly tax regime. “Most importantly, we parade impressive Ease of Doing Business (EoDB) credentials.”

He acknowledged Onu as a consummate and resilient businessman “who has been able to hold his own in the hospitality industry” and congratulated him for successfully increasing the tally of his business outfits, asking God to bless the endeavour.