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…assigns portfolios to commissioners
By Ikhili Ebalu, Benin City.
The Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, has sworn-in 11 commissioners and two Special Advisers as members of the Edo State Executive Council (EXCO).
The commissioners and their portfolios include: Joseph Eboigbe is the Commissioner for Finance; Prof. Obehi Akoria, Health; Mrs. Otse Momoh-Omorogbe, Budget and Planning; Dr. Joan Osa Oviawe, Education; Isoken Omo, Physical Planning and Urban Development.
Others are Moses Agbukor, Water Resources; Ethan Uzamere, Mining, Gas and Oil; Maria Edeko, Social Development and Gender; Monday Osaigbovo, Local Government; Andrew Emwanta, Communication and Orientation, while Oluwole Iyamu is Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice.
The two Special Advisers are Crusoe Osagie, who was appointed as Special Adviser, Media Projects and Sarah Esangbedo Ajose-Adeogun, appointed as Special Adviser, Strategy, Policy, Projects and Performance Management.
The inaugural EXCO meeting was held after the Commissioners and Special Advisers were sworn-in.
The governor urged, “We must advocate transparency and uphold accountability in all we do in our respective portfolios. In enthroning a high-performance culture, an organizational performance scorecard has been developed for each ministry.
“The scorecard will be deployed in tracking key performance targets and deliverables of each Ministry and reports will be demanded on a quarterly basis. A formal assessment of performance targets and results achieved by each Ministry shall be conducted. These shall form the basis of further review and linkages to other key human resource processes.
He continued: “On our part, we have articulated, in the MEGA Agenda, a vision of where we want Edo State to be before 2050. Making Edo Great Again and Edo becoming the best state to live and prosper in Nigeria are promises we have made to the good people of Edo State who massively turned out to vote for this Government in September 2020.
“As Commissioners and Special Advisers, the height of people’s expectations of you and the Government you represent are unprecedented. We have no choice but to meet and deliver on the expectations of the people. As we serve the people, we must become champions of high performance, disciplined in execution and results-oriented.”
“Timely response to the needs and requests from our people must become rooted in our DNA. We must demonstrate and demand ‘value for money’, a commercial mindset not previously associated with the Public Service,” he added.
He noted that the new members of the State Executive Council must embrace the Six Pillars of the MEGA Agenda and ensure it constitutes a rallying platform that shall generate an irreversible momentum that will industrialize, transform and build the capacity required to take advantage of the state natural endowments.
According to him, “As a sub-national, we have been impacted severely by these realities, and as Commissioners taking on the reign of governance at these times, riding the storm will not be easy. These are inauspicious times and as a government, we are today faced with dwindling revenue base, caused mainly by drop in FAAC allocation, while our Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) is not at the desired level. COVID-19 continues to be a major threat to the health and wellbeing of our people, with a segment of the society suffering severe casualties.
“These are no ordinary times. We are today living in a world that has been ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic. The impact of the pandemic has been devastating across world economies, with adverse effects on healthcare systems. These have been worsened by insecurity, which has risen with civil strifes of different kinds, causing a failure of national and international institutions in a manner that was never anticipated.
“I am pleased to advise that the commissioners will be inheriting vastly improved Ministries, whose Organizational Structures and operating processes have been reviewed and brought in line with best practices in their respective areas.
“The Public Service Transformation exercise has also focused on rebuilding human capacity within the ministries. We have thus commenced a structured recruitment of talented, young and experienced administrative and technical professionals to shore up the capacity gaps that exist in the public service.”
“Our ICT capabilities have been strengthened and technology has been deployed to underpin many of our operating processes such that in the near future, the Edo State Government shall be so technology-enabled that manual processing shall gradually become a thing of the past.”
