Governor Adams Oshiomhole

Adibe Emenyonu 

The World Bank has commended the transformation agenda, people- oriented policies, transparency in government, public procurement and good governance under the administration of Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State in the past four years.
The multilateral institution’s commendation came through its International Development Agency (IDA), at the commencement of a three day inspection visit and technical sessions on the Edo State Employment and Expenditure for Results/ Development Policy Operations (Edo SEEFOR/DPO), an IDA assisted programme.

IDA’s Task Team Leader (TTL), Jens Christensen, who stated this Thurday praised the state government for meeting conditions that enabled it access an earlier $75 million grant from the World Bank.
He said Edo state was the first ahead of four states in South-South geo-political zone of Nigeria, where the special programme was designed for.

According to him, “I want to say clearly that the World Bank Group, the IDA is extra-ordinarily proud to be a partner with Edo state, one of the things we look forward when we want to find people to support them is ownership, drive, vision and able to deliver and it is clear that when we look across the states in Nigeria, Edo state is one of the states we are very proud and happy to be able to partner with.

“It is clear that in our line of service, we do not want to implement reforms, we do not want to design reform, we want to support the reformers we want results delivered, we want our counterparts to be in the driver’s seat and we support.
“It is clear to us that Edo performs, we have seen its involvement in urban and rural infrastructure, drainage, and youth activities and we have also seen compared to many other parts of Nigeria the reform agenda that is taking place.”

Continuing Christensen said: “We have seen reforms in the ICT sector. You have passed the procurement law and now are the time for implementing it. You have also taken the steps for biometric analysis and implementation. The essence of this visit is to take stock of SEEFOR projects. SEEFOR is a project designed for states in the Niger Delta and Edo is the first mover.”
Commending the SEEFOR Project Coordinating team led by Taiwo Akerele for their proper handling of the scheme Christensen said the European Union had also made $100 million available for the benefiting states.

Earlier, Chairman of the SEEFOR steering committee and deputy governor of Edo State, Dr. Pius Odubu, said the state had long adopted the essentials of good governance in the state by investing huge resources “in revamping social infrastructure and human capacity development.”