Senator Magnus Ngei Abe representing Rivers South East senatorial district in the National Assembly has defended his empowerment initiatives, saying that blind criticism would less to stop him assisting indigent students and widows. Abe, who described the reactions to his mission as “unfiltered criticisms”, added that his quest is to give lease of life to the poor and needy. Even as he was responding to his critics, Abe was at the same time responding to the beneficiaries of his scholarship scheme as he issued them with bank drafts. About 300 beneficiaries of the annual school fees support scheme run by the senator received bank drafts.
By this development, 900 indigent final year students in institutions of higher learning drawn from the seven local government areas of the Rivers South East of include Andoni, Eleme, Gokana, Khana, Opobo/Nkoro, Oyigbo and Tai have benefitted from the exercise that started in 2012.
Abe, who disclosed this while presenting the support to the students at his constituency office in Bori, headquarters of Khana local government area, said the empowerment initiatives he introduced, some of which are designed to provide employment and build capacity in the Senatorial Distric,t were not part of his constituency project.
“What I do is between me and my God. I don’t effect actions to expect praise. Whatever I do is based on my conviction. It is about my relationship with my people and not about what people will say or not,” the Senate Committee Chairman on Petroleum (Downstream) said.
He stated that the scholarship scheme among others were initiated in line with his commitment “to invest in the people, encourage educational excellence and competition,” adding that a society without competition produces people who know everybody, but know nothing.
“Amongst us here, are people from different backgrounds, and political belief. What qualifies you for this exercise is merit. The reason we insist on merit is that any society that does not base its values on merit will be full of people who know everybody but know nothing. We want to build a society full of people who know something even if they don’t know anybody.”
“There are people whose stock-in-trade is to condemn others. Their attitude cannot stop us from doing what we think is right or God’s intention for us. If we buy wrappers for the women of the district as part of our appreciation strategy outside the constituency projects, what is wrong with that?” the senator asked.
In their remarks, facilitator of the scheme, Kadilo Kabari, President, National Union of Oyigbo Students, Nwankwo Chijioke, that of Andoni, Timi Mbaba, and their Opobo/Nkoro counterpart, Solomon Tamunotonye, vowed that students from the senatorial district will continue to support Abe in whatever he aspires for politically.
Comrade Tamunotonye of Opobo/Nkoro particularly faulted report that Opobo natives had not benefited from the tenure of Abe in the senate, insisting that students from the LGA have benefitted immensely from the Senator’s programmes.
Source: TheNeighbourhood