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In 2009 the government had succeeded at symbiotically resonating with Akwa Ibom
local communities, taking the needs of the people as inalienable dividends of democracy,
established several people oriented policies and programmes, and defined the people
as the focal point and fulcrum of the dynamics of the administration. On account
of principled people agenda the government targeted the building of a dynamic, prosperous,
and productive people and intrinsically tripled the delivery of projects in 2009
to 529 from the 188 of 2008.
The strategic direction of the state in 2009 was the programme of free and compulsory
education with the attendant infrastructure requirements, policies, finance, personnel,
processes, and supply chain management. The inter-ministerial direct labour coordinating
committee therefore yielded to support this strategic direction by injecting infrastructure
required to support the programme which attracted 62% of delivery count with 327
school building projects in every local government area of the state against only
22 in 2008. Besides, with the government’s position that each local government will
have at least two model free boarding schools, it became imperative to rehabilitate
and construct befitting school buildings in every community of the state to promote
a culture of equal opportunity and equal access for all Akwa Ibom children.
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Rekindled Hopes
Mini water projects took 9% delivery in 2009 with 47 water projects, up from 28
in 2008. 22 LGAs benefited from the mini water projects with Mkpat Enin and Ibeno
benefiting the most with 5 of such water projects each.
With government commitment to overhaul the health care system in the state, health
facilities took 7% of the 2009 project distribution with 35 health facilities projects,
up from 19 in 2008 and spread across 17 local government areas with such projects
as rehabilitation or construction of laboratories, hospital wards, staff quarters,
perimeter fence and gates, as well as service halls.
There were 17 civic building projects in 2009 that took 3% of the delivery in 10
LGAs with such structures as motherless babies homes, town halls, market stalls,
corpers lodge in Itu, dormitories in Ikot Ekpene children’s home, child welfare
clinic in Ukanafun, and skills acquisition center in Udong Uko.
It became easy in 2009 for government to touch base with citizens to demand what
they want the administration to do for them. This interraction is to be seen in
future deliveries.
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It was an even distribution of projects across all local government areas of the
state. All LGAs were touched this time with 12 LGAs receiving in excess of 20 projects.
However, Obot Akara and Ini LGAs received the lowest count of projects with 2 and
7 projects respectively. Uyo, the capital city received more projects than other
LGAs with 34 projects giving it 6% of 2009 delivery volume, down from 15% with 28
projects in 2008 to underscore an even spread in 2009. Ibeno followed with 25 projects
at 5% of total delivery, while Esit Eket landed 24 projects.
The inter-ministerial committee also ventured into the area of roads to complement
the state government’s massive road construction by delivering two roads in Esit
Eket with a 3Km road at Ikpa and a 2Km road in Edor.
With the 2009 inter-ministerial projects, which were commissioned from 27th January
to 23rd April government successfully keyed into the needs of the people with critical
transformative structures to raise living standards and bottom out the destabilising
effects of poverty for sustainable livelihood for all Akwa Ibom communities.
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