BENIN CITY – Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole has identified political will as a panacea to eradicate poverty declaring “Poverty can be eradicated if there is a political will to deal with it.”
He made the identification when participants of the National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Kuru Course 38 group five paid him a courtesy visit in Benin City yesterday.
Governor Oshiomhole philosophized, “poverty anywhere is a threat to prosperity everywhere. That explains the ease with which people are ready to deal with somebody else but they cannot continue living in pain and deprivation.”
Therefore, he explained that politics should be value-driven especially as the purpose of government is to provide the enabling environment by building infrastructure schools and employment of qualified teachers for quality education, roads, health facilities, and even providing for skills acquisition among others just as his administration had been able to actualise in Edo State such as the re-roof schools roads and the ultra-modern central hospital.
He posited that neither lamentation nor sermonisation or moral re-armament could eradicate poverty, adding “Government must use its instrument to deliver the greatest good to the greatest number of people,” as against satisfying the only the needs of the elites.
Governor Oshiomhole, who is an alumnus of NIPSS, having been its participant of its Course Nine 29 years ago, commended the institute for keeping the tradition and described its 2016 course theme “Strengthening Mechanism For Poverty Reduction And Inclusive Development In Nigeria” as apt, emphasizing that “Poverty can be defeated if it will be defeated.”
Earlier, the Acting Director-General of National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies and leader of the group of management and participants, Mr. Jonathan Juma, Mni, discloses that NIPSS was established in 1979 for, among other purposes, carrying out of research programmes.
Mr. Juma, who expressed confidence in Governor Oshiomhole as an alumnus of NIPSS being an encouragement for them to feel at home coupled with the cooperation of the people, affirmed that they were confident that they would accomplish their assignment.
The Acting Director-General commended Governor Oshiomhole for building infrastructure in the state as evident from the few they had seen since they arrived on Sunday.
Highpoint of the visit was the exchange of souvenirs between the Acting Director General of NIPSS and the Governor.
Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole (right) receiving a memento from Acting Director General, NIPSS, Mr. Jonathan Juma, during a courtesy visit by the delegation from NIPSS on Monday in Government House.
