By Newman Ubani
The humanitarian and charity works and activities of the Wife of the Governor of Abia State, Mrs Nkechi Ikpeazu has continued to win her laurels. The most recent of these laurels being the Distinguished International Service Award by the Rotary Club International of Nigeria, District 9142, Umuahia, for her outstanding contributions to human capacity building, promoting health and empowering indigent women in Abia State. The award presentation took place at Abia Hotels and Recreation Centre, Umuahia in a programme put together to recognise professional women in Rotary.
It is common knowledge that Rotary Club is a well known international organisation for charities and human capacity development all over the world. The Club has been in the vanguard of rendering humanitarian services, a business that has made her renowned.
In her response at the event, the Wife of the Governor, Mrs. Ikpeazu noted the roles of women in the family and the essence of her organization, which she said shares same vision with Rotary. Her words; “As you know, women play a vital role in keeping the home front and shape values in nation building”.
“My organization, the Vicar Hope Foundation shares similarity of roles as the Rotary Club so there are opportunities to partner in uplifting humanity and this award will spur me to do more”.
The speech of the District Governor of Rotary Club International District 9142, Mr. Dan Agawara, captured the reason for giving the award to the wife of Abia Governor, Mrs Nkechi Ikpeazu. He stated that, it is a well deserved one for her sterling contributions towards humanity. He particularly thanked her for using Vicar Hope Foundation to touch lives as well as identifying with the Rotary Club International.
The Rotary Club was careful to have selected Mrs. Ikpeazu based on obvious facts and her works in many areas of life including; human capacity building, promoting health and empowering indigent women in Abia State. Of course, Mrs. Ikpeazu has never ceased from doing these things which seem to be her call.
In human capacity building, Mrs. Ikpeazu has organized workshops and seminars for different sets of groups and individuals including; Ndi Ugoeze, NGOs, Women etc. Mrs. Ikpeazu, has built houses for widows and indigent people in the State. She has helped many physically challenged individuals and restored hope to the needy. In the healthcare services, she has initiated many programmes aimed at delivering medical care to Abia people. One of the programmes initiated is sickle cell care centre launched in Aba. The understanding of this centre is to establish, maintain and run a sickle cell clinic at the vicinity of the General Hospital, Aba. The centre would save Abians from the burden of sickle cell disease.
By establishing the clinic, the persons with sickle cell anaemia in the State can now access healthcare at General Hospital Aba. This specialised care is one of the efforts of the visionary health friendly Governor, Okezie Victor Ikpeazu PHD to see that the health of every citizen of Abia is taken care of.
The Wife of the Governor, Mrs. Nkechi Ikpeazu deserves to be celebrated in view of the award presented to her by the Rotary Club International as she has continued to support the vision of her husband and Governor of Abia State. It is congratulations to Mrs. Nkechi Ikpeazu as she would do more in the years ahead, especially in the second tenure of Governor Ikpeazu’s administration.
Mrs. Ikpeazu has trained and empowered above 1,600 women. This number does not include the ones she empowered informally. This is in her determination to make life better and easier for an average woman in Abia State. Being the founder of Vicar Hope Foundation, a foundation that is dedicated to helping the needy and less previleged individuals in the State, Mrs. Nkechi Ikpeazu has in these few years of Governor Okezie Ikpeazu’s administration consistently empowered many women.
She has embarked on skill acquisition programmes for women in various Local Government Areas, organizations and groups. Most recently, she is training about 200 women of the Christ the King Catholic Church (CKC) Aba. Of which the first batch of 50 women have graduated. This first batch were trained in the areas of tailoring, fashion & designing, cosmetology (that is making of perfumes, air fresheners, etc) and bakery.
It is also fresh in the memory that in recent times, a set of 50 trainees of the Springboard Skill Acquisition Programme, powered by Mrs. Ikpeazu with support from the Abia State Oil Producing Areas Development Commission and with technical assistance from National Directorate of Employment graduated in Ikwuano Local Government Area. Equally, graduands of various skill acquisition programmes of Wife of the Abia State Governor in some Local Government Areas including Ukwa East Local Government Council went with various equipment to start-up business. This is in addition to hundreds of graduands who have benefited by the training and empowerment.
UNU,
31/01/2019
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