Rotary Empowers Women, Girls on Skills Acquisition in Rivers

Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

Rotary Club of Port Harcourt Express, Rivers State, has empowered over 20 women and girls of the Rumuokwurusi Community in Obio/Akpor Local Government Area of the state on skills acquisition.

The project organised by Rotary in partnership with students of Airforce Military School and Airforce Girls Military School, Jos, was held in Rumuokwurushi community hall, Port Harcourt.

President of the Rotary Club, Shittu Abdulrasheed, who spoke with journalists during the programme, said it was organised to empower women and girls with various skills that will enable them to earn a living and become employers of labour.

Participants were trained on baking, cooking, beadwork, cloth making, liquid soap production segment, and others. They were also given financial assistance to support the knowledge acquired at the training.

According to Abdulrasheed, the three-day skills acquisition workshop, which ended yesterday, was targeted for girls and women in Rumuokwurusi community.

He said it’s one of the service projects for the current Rotary year 2023/2024 with the theme: ‘Create hope in the world’.

“This is our own way of domiciling the creation of hope in the world by doing this skill acquisition workshop for girls and women in our host Rumuokwurusi community.

“When you give skill to a woman or a girl, you are basically affecting the socio-economic trajectory of the family. Whatever she is able to make of that skill to empower herself will translate into progress for her children and family.

“Ultimately, our desire is that these girls and women will transfer some of these skills to other girls and women in the community, so by empowering them, we have empowered the community and by empowering the community, we are indeed on the way to creating hope in the country and in the world.”

Reacting in the gesture, the Community Development Committee Chairman of the host community, He said: “We are overwhelmed by this kind gesture shown to our wives and daughters, the entire Rumuokwurusi community is grateful to Rotary Club of Port Harcourt Express. In fact, I lack words to describe, explain and quantify how I feel right now, and I will continue to pray for them.”

One of the entrepreneurs and resource person for Liquid Multi-Purpose Soap production, Mr. Christopher Egbochie, explained that the participants can use professional liquid soap production to start up their lives.

Mrs. Grace Chijioke, a woman in her 60s wished that the training had come when she was still very young, so as to generate income from it. In her local Ikwerre dialect, she said: “I am very happy just that they did not bring it on time, they are bringing it now that we are getting older; they would have brought it when I am very younger.”