Gombe Pledges Collaboration with   UNICEF on Education, Healthcare

Segun Awofadeji

Gombe  State Governor, Alhaji Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya, has  expressed his administration’s readiness to collaborate with development partners towards the upliftment of the standard of the living of the people of Gombe State.

The governor made the position known while receiving a delegation from the United Nations Children’s Fund(UNICEF) who paid him a courtesy visit on the sidelines of its inspection visit to Gombe State yesterday.

He appreciated the support of the UN agency in executing projects especially in critical sectors of education and health.

The governor noted that Gombe State is a beneficiary of many collaborative projects and programmes with UNICEF, citing the successful mopping up and enrolment of about 400,000 out of school children through BESDA as one of the instances where Gombe benefited a lot.

He specifically recognised the inputs of UNICEF and other UN agencies in drafting the State’s ten year development plan which he said aligns with the UN’s SDGs and UNICEF’s vision and mission.

“Our 10-year development plan aligned with the targets of SDGs, Unicef and all United Nations agencies that are collaborating with us towards improving the standard of living of our people,” he said.

Governor Inuwa intimated the team of his administration’s great achievements of providing healthcare services to the people.

“It may interest you to know that, to ensure proper provision of health care services at the grassroots, in less than three years we were able to provide at least one functional healthcare facility in each of the 114 wards of Gombe State,” he said.

The governor told the visiting UNICEF team that Gombe State has concluded plans to engage 440 health workers to augment the strength of human resources for more productivity in the health sector.

The governor added: “We plan to engage an average of 40 health personnel in each of the 11 Local Governments. Not only that we also insist that each health worker attends to his place of work by taking inventory, the initiative we brought of having biometric attendance and records from all the staff of primary health care and general hospitals is helping us a lot to provide necessary man power in the sector and ensure efficiency and productivity.”

He pledged his government’s continued support towards execution of collaborative programmes with UNICEF. “Our doors are open, any day any time, we look forward to jointly working with you in the execution of projects and programmes that especially help our younger ones.

“I also want to assure you, that not only me but the whole of my cabinet and the people of Gombe are supportive of your coming and the activities you are undertaking”, he assured.

Speaking earlier,  the UNICEF team lead, Dr. Ephrem Tekle Lemang, who is an Associate Director of Immunization in the organisation’s headquarters in New York thanked Governor Yahaya for his hospitality, adding that his team was impressed with what they see in Gombe State with respect to infrastructural and human capital development.

“One of the things that really impressed us is your commitment to health education and economic growth of Gombe State. It says a lot about your commitment and directly implies your faith in investing in young people of Gombe which is very crucial to the future development of the state,” he said.

The UNICEF Team lead appreciated Governor Inuwa’s foresight in deploying women health workers in the revitalised healthcare facilities, observing that many of the maternal and child health care services are better served by women health workers.

 Ephrem assured that UNICEF as a partner that works on the improvement of life of  children, adolescents and young people will continue to work and support Gombe State Government in areas of common interests.