The African Development Bank (AfDB) has promised to assist the wife of Ondo State Governor, Mrs. Betty Anyanwu-Akeredolu, in current projects designed to economically empower and socially develop women in the state.
The AfDB’s Senior Director, and Head of the Nigeria Country Office, Mr. Ebirima Faal, made the pledge during a technical session of the bank’s management team with the governor’s wife office in Akure.
Earlier, Anyanwu-Akeredolu had solicited the collaboration of the bank in the execution of her various women empowerment programmes.
Specifically, she pleaded for the bank’s support for women and children in key areas namely, quality healthcare delivery, maternal and child mortality reduction, poverty alleviation as well as gender parity among others.
She listed some of the achievements within one year in office as including, ICT training for 105 girls from across Ondo State, Solar Renewable Energy training for over 200 girls from the state and skill acquisition trainings for over 1,000 women in five Local Government Areas through FOWOSA, one of her women empowerment programmes.
Others are, accelerated birth registration and breast cancer awareness campaign, among others.
The governor’s wife explained that the programmes were successfully implemented despite the financial constraints of the government.
Faal commended Anyanwu-Akeredolu for her passion to improve the socio-economic conditions of women and children in the state, saying that all her areas of focus align with AfDB’s poverty alleviation goals.
A member of the team, Linda Amadi, the governor’s wife for her community-oriented programmes and projects which, she said, guaranteed sustainability.
Amadi noted that the governor wife’s programmes are areas of interest to the bank, including the AfDB’s Africa Initiative which is targeted at generating about 25 million jobs for the youths within the next 10 years.
