By Darlington UDOBONG
One of the initiatives of Akwa Ibom First Lady, Mrs. Martha Udom Emmanuel, the Ultra-Modern Market in ONNA Local Government Area, has been lauded by aides of the Governor who stormed the area to assess the progress of work at the project site.
According to the Governor’s aides, Akparawa Idorenyin Raphael, Special Assistant on Trade and Market Matters, and Comrade Martins Inyangetoh, Special Assistant on Project Monitoring, the project, powered by Family Empowerment and Youth Re-Orientation Programme (FEYReP), a pet project of the First Lady, has reached 80 percent completion.
The aides hinted that “the Governor’s Wife is committed to ensuring that market men and women as well as the entire the people of the area have a befitting market place that is embedded with all the modern facilities.”
“The Governor’s Wife is a kindhearted and trader friendly First Lady. She took it upon herself, through her pet project, FEYReP, to give the market a face-lift. She is raising the market standard from a local market to an ultra-modern market where business will be done round-the-clock. By this project, the local government area vis-à-vis Akwa Ibom State will have more Internally Generated Revenue (IGR),” they added.
The Governor’s aides further informed that the market, consisting over 70 lockup stores and 50 open stores, when completed, will enable traders in the state who have been enjoying Ticket-Free Day and Interest-Free Loans, to step-up and compete favourably with their contemporaries outside the state.
They commended the Governor’s Wife for her “show of love, concern and care for the people of Akwa Ibom.”
The aides also made a brief stopover at the Palace of the Paramount Ruler of ONNA Local Government Area, His Royal Majesty Raymond Timothy Inyang, and extolled him for the support of the Traditional Rulers Council during the 2019 general elections, adding that their support saw to “the victory of the Governor and PDP at the polls.”
