PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari summoned all the State Governors in Abuja to brainstorm and find solution to the escalating insecurity in the country.
Governor Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta State, who disclosed this prior to the scheduled meeting, also raised the alarm over population explosion in the country, saying with slow economic grow, it was a recipe for crisis.
Noting that the security situation in the state was not as dangerous as some states of the federation, he said it called for concern, especially the menace of herdsman, which was getting worse by the day in parts of the state.
The President and governors frontally addressed the matter at the top-level meeting; he said leaders of the country must proffer solution to the menace before it kills us all.
His words, “Delta state is not even classified as one of the insecurity states, it is not considered as one with great insecurity challenges, but I think the issue has become national and a lot of people are talking about it now. In fact, the President summoned a meeting of state governors and the issue of insecurity is among critical matters discussed.”
“This is an issue across the country and we must begin to find solution to it. We need solution and I hope we are able to find solutions, “he added.
On population blast, he said, “There are no doubts that there are a lot of issues, issues of insecurity, there are issues of minimum wage, issues of whether the economy of this country is able to grow in such a way that it can outgrow that of population, these are issues we must discuss.
Because we have a huge challenge in our hand as the population is growing astronomically and our economy growing at a slow pace, which is also a risk for crisis and nobody, is talking about it, and many people are not raising this issue”
“This is an issue we must look at as a state because as long as the population is growing at a very fast rate and the economy is going down, we are only planning for crisis and definitely not for development. I pray that as a nation, we can sit back and plan about it and we must realize that adequate planning in terms of economy must start with population planning,” he added.
Governor Okowa said the state government was aware of the activities of herdsmen in the state, which have prevented farmers from going to farm, but maintained that the Federal Government had to make certain policy statements to enable security agencies tackle the problem.
To take the issues of security very high, the governor said he has plans to support the vigilante groups and recognize their contributions.
Okowa, who appreciated the media for their support for his government, vowed to pursue vigorously the development of infrastructure in the riverine areas of the state.
“As we begin our second term, we will begin to pay attention to the riverine communities because of their needs and also essentially a lot of our resources as a nation and as a state also come from there. As we continue our second term, let me make a passionate appeal that we continue to be partners in progress so that we can achieve more,” he said.
He urged journalists to communicate to him issues that they think will drive development as partners because every Deltan has a right to be a contributor.
Speaking on the girl-child, he said, “And this time, we are going to pay special attention to the girl child because if you empower a woman, you empower a family. If you empower a man, yes you may be empowering a family, but you may just empower that man, but I believe that a very special attention must be paid to the girl child.”
Okowa promised to be frank and make positive stand when looking at developmental that affect the state in a bid to leave lasting mark in governance.
He promised that there would be a stronger Delta at the end of the SMART agenda; hence, his second term slogan is “stronger Delta”.
He promised to upscale the issues of health care by providing functional health centres across all the wards in the state.
Okowa further promised to build more Technical Schools in a bid to give enduring skills to youths to trigger economic growth going forward.
“We need 19 more Technical schools across the state because we want every youth to have skills in addition to academic knowledge, that is the way to go,” he said.
Speaking on the new minimum wage, “We have made commitment to pay minimum wage,” adding that government was waiting for the modalities from the federal government to be able to know how it would impact on the resources of the state.
He dismissed the speculation that he had plan to ban tricycles in the state, saying, “You know with social media, people can say a lot of things that I did not say. I have not contemplated banning Keke, if we should do that, we must have an alternative in place, the buses and taxi are even more expensive, so what alternative do we have, I am not banning keke, we have never talked about it.”
On his recent meeting with Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo state, he said it was economic development, the need to drive the economy of the two states and handle the electricity issues bedeviling the states