The untold sufferings that widows, pensioners and other vulnerable groups have been subjected to in Abia State would come to an end next year if the All Progressives Congress (APC) takes control of the state.
This promise was made by the governorship candidate of APC in Abia, High Chief Ikechi Emenike while addressing a stakeholders meeting at Ikwuano local government, saying that he was deeply touched by the plight of these vulnerable groups.
In the course of his consultative tour of the 17 local governments of Abia, widows and pensioners come around in organised groups to present their plight to the governorship hopeful, expressing support for him to become Abia chief executive in 2023 to end their sufferings.
Emenike, who took pity on the widows said that he would run a people friendly, inclusive administration that would take special care of the vulnerable groups, including widows and pensioners.
“You have a husband in me, you have a father in me,” he told the widows, adding that his administration would pay monthly stipends to widows, empower them and also abolish all obnoxious cultural practices targeted at women.
The APC governorship flag bearer, who has chosen a woman to be his running mate, said that women would have a prominent place in his government because they play a very special role in stabilising the family and society.
“The quality of a family depends on the quality of the woman in the house. If you elevate the woman you elevate the standard of the family,” he said.
Emenike further assured that under an APC administration in Abia come 2023, women would be put in charge of quality ministries, not just confining them to the ministry of woman affairs as has become the practice over the years.
On the plight of Abia pensioners, the APC governorship hopeful said that it was inhuman for a government in power to fail to perform the simplest duty of paying pensions and gratuities.
He promised to prioritise offsetting the backlogs of pensions and gratuities by setting up rotational ad hoc committee composed of pensioners who themselves would oversee the clearing of the pension arrears.
The development economist described as ridiculous the practice of counting payment of salaries and pensions as achievements of government, adding that it is equally absurd for governorship candidates to using payment of salaries as campaign premises.
“Abia workers are being owed salaries because we have a government that doesn’t serve the people,” he said, adding that any government that can’t pay salaries and pensions for up to three months has no legitimacy to continue existing.