Abia to institutionalise long-term planning with 25-year agenda

The Abia Government says it has concluded arrangements to present to the people its 25-year development plan, designed to put the state on a structured and sustainable development path.

The Commissioner for Information, Mr Okey Kanu, disclosed this while briefing newsmen on the outcome of Monday’s state Executive Council meeting in Umuahia.

Kanu said that the document sets out short, medium and long-term goals with defined funding options and had been designed to outlive successive administrations.

“The plan will outline short, medium and long-term aggregate goals in a sequential progression.

“The ultimate goal for evolving the plan is developing the state in a structured manner, regardless of the administration in power,” Kanu said.

He further said that the government would seek legislative backing to ensure uninterrupted implementation, adding that the plan builds on the state’s current reform trajectory.

He also announced that the Abia State Material Testing Laboratory was ready for inauguration, saying that the facility would play a key role in checking building collapse.

He said, “The operation of the lab will ensure that collapse of private or public buildings in the state is mitigated or totally eliminated.”

He said that the second batch of the 2025 teachers’ recruitment received 28,813 applications before the portal closed on Nov. 6.

The commissioner said that the applicants were given additional window for verification.

According to him, all the applicants have until Dec. 5 to complete this verification process to enable them to be shortlisted for the CBT tests.

He also said that the Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education had completed the state’s first annual school census in 24 years.

Kanu said that the digital census, which started on May 20, covered 4,150 schools, 1.7 million learners and 45,151 staff.

He said that some private school owners were reluctant to release enrollment figures, adding that the exercise still yielded valuable data.

He said : “One of the major highlights of this exercise was the distribution of 1,221 Android tablets to school heads and data officers across the state

“The exercise also included the training of public school heads, principals, private school proprietors and 100 mentors facilitated by the National Education Management Information System.”

Kanu said that the mentors were deployed across all the 17 LGAs, adding that “all schools successfully uploaded data digitally, using the NEMIS portal for the very first time in the state”.

Kanu further stated that the state’s adult and non-formal education programme had commenced in communities across Abia.

He said that the government wants to ensure that residents who missed formal schooling earlier in life can still acquire basic education.

“This is first to make them employable or armed with the right knowledge that will aid them in their chosen lines of endeavour,” the commissioner said.

He further spoke on how far the government had performed to address the state’s infrastructure needs.

He said that the Ministry of Works had carried out direct-labour interventions in 50 locations, completing five projects and adding seven new sites to its maintenance schedule.