WRITTEN BY GAB OKPALAEZE
When the Fumilayo Ransome-Kutis, the Magaret Ekpos and the Janet Mokelus of this world and their contemporaries were bestriding the narrow world of women in
politics and social welfarist activism in Nigeria, it was like there would be no others. But events of these days have really proven that, then, the beautiful ones were not yet born.
Again, there came the subtle incursion of women into leadership, be it at the board room, pulpit, home front, high brow professional groupings, socio-cultural, welfarist and political spaces in the country. Call it the era of Dora Akunyilis, Ngozi-Okonjo Iwealas, Serah Jubrils etcetera, and it would gladly fit into the various roles played by women in emancipating and reconstructing the societal relevance of the feminine gender.
However, the most subtle approach to stardom and socio-economic and welfarist relevance appears to be the one being employed by the wife of the Anambra state governor and mother of Ndi Anambra today, Chief Mrs. Ebelechukwu Obiano, Osodieme. Soon after the first inauguration of her husband, Chief Willie Obiano, as the executive governor of Anambra state in 2014, the first lady had already hatched a carefully thought-out plan of emancipating the minds, hands and feet, lips and hips, as well as the pockets, otherwise called the stomach infrastructure, of the various people and homes.
Under her Caring Family Enhancement Initiative, CAFÉ, programme, Osodieme decided to bring succour to souls troubled by one form of health challenge or the other, homes challenged by inability to feed three times a day, and societies devoid of basic social and hygienic amenities or the other.
And so, early in the life of her husband’s first term in office, Chief Mrs Obiano had sourced funds and material resources from family and friends, associates and people of like minds for the purchase and distribution of prosthetic limbs to people living with one deformity or the other . Not a small number of people benefitted again from her pet programme and initiative, CAFÉ in the areas of fixing and restoring cut off or deformed upper and lower lips, under the cleft lip and cleft palate project in all parts of the State. It was like magic or miracle seeing people whose hands and feet, hips or knee bones, were initially malfunctioning and those with speech impediments becoming whole and well again , thanks to Osodieme’s CAFÉ initiative.
It did not take any longer for genuine international agencies and institutions with eyes on the ball, to begin to appraise her works independently and coming to conclusions that her approach to solving health, hygiene and societal issues was unprecedented, ingenious, original and practical.
No wonder she was recognized and installed the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Ambassador in 2016 by the European Union and UNICEF, for her efforts in providing water boreholes, public toilets, and other conveniences at markets and public places across the state.
This time around, the Anambra first lady has been selected out of top most echelons of society, for the 2017 prestigious Zik Prize for Humanitarian leadership Award.
Hear the tone of the letter conferring the Zik prize on Osodieme, “We are pleased to inform you that after an exhaustive appraisal of nominees, the Advisory Board of Public Policy Research and Analysis Centre (PPRAC) has named you the winner of the year 2017 Zik prize in Humanitarian Leadership.” This suffices to say that Chief Mrs. Obiano was selected from among all other nominees, for her visionary establishment of CAFÉ and its records of achievements.
Even as the organizers of Zik Prize for Humanitarian Leadership were concluding arrangements to officially confer this award on Chief Mrs Ebelechukwu Obiano on Sunday April 15, 2018 at the Civil Centre, Victoria Island, Lagos, the Anambra first lady has gone ahead, doing good things. One of the greatest fruits emanating from her ever flowing milk of human kindness was the CAFE Home for the mentally deranged at Nteje, where scores of inmates have been treated, rehabilitated and re-united with their families. The story of a sixty-year-old woman from Umudioka Awka, Mrs Rose Anene, who lost link with her family for over thirty-five years, due to her illness but now rehabilitated and re-united with her children, is a good case in point.
Should we begin to talk of homeless families from across the three senatorial zones of the state, which Osodieme provided with comfortable homes in their villages and towns? The list of practical solutions Osodieme’s CAFÉ has brought to bear on myriads of human problems is endless.
This is why ndi –Anambra from all walks of life should join the rest of the world in standing up in recognition for this thorough bred mother of the state and wife of their indefatigable governor, Osodieme Ebelechukwu Obiano , at this her glorious moment .
Comments are closed for this post.