THE Jigawa State Director of the National Orientation Agency (NOA), Hajiya Tani Umar has reiterated the agency’s resolve to strategise and raise the bar for the campaign against poliomyelitis in the state through collaboration with the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON).
The National Primary Healthcare Development Agency decided to bring NOA on board because it has the capacity to mobilise the grassroots using its local government desk officers to make the people take ownership of government programmes.
About 16 cases of wild polio virus were recorded between 2011 and 2012 in Jigawa State, in 2011 Babura, Gwiwa, Birnin-Kudu, Roni and Kafin- Hausa local governments had one polio case each while Ringim and Guri local governments had 3 and 2 each respectively.
In 2012, Auyo, Buji and Birnin-Kudu local governments had one each while Babura local government had three cases.
She said the agency, which is known to bring governance closer to people by making them aware of government programmes so that they can appreciate government thinking, is capable of breaking the barrier that has made the people to be ignorant of the benefit of having their children immunised against the deadly virus.
Umar indicated that because NOA is critical about the issue at hand in terms of mobilisation of the people, the cases of the deadly virus would soon ease out in the state.
“It is by virtue of this that you find a lot of agencies, ministries, parastatals, government establishments, donor agencies and the likes reaching out to partner with an organ they know is critical to their success in terms of mobilising the people’s opinion on most of their programmes.
“This was one of the latest of partnership that brought us together with all the ALGON chairmen of high risk States that were identified to have been harbouring the polio virus.”
She pointed out that during the course of their discussion at the workshop with the ALGON chairmen of the affected states, it was clear that ridding Nigeria of poliomyelitis is definitely going to be a plus for the country and the agency must work to achieve that.
The director said the local government has also recognised that NOA has the capacity to partner with them and they, as political arrowheads, have the wherewithal to co-operate with officers of the agency at the local government levels.
“That was the crux of the matter and that was what took us to the workshop. Now after the programme on the brainstorming we now agreed that each of the directors will partner with the ALGON chairmen respectively to fashion out how to deal with the situation.”
She pointed out that Jigawa has the best of strategies in evolving ways and means of tackling the very serious matter.
Umar said it has gone to the level whereby the governor personally instituted a task force from top to the bottom in each local government area and it shows the seriousness that government attaches to the issue.
She said it would make the job easy especially now that they have identified the major cause of the new cases in recent times to be from border towns.
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