Cross River State Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, Mr Okon Owuna, has disclosed that the ongoing Life Project recruitment exercise in the state had nothing to do with politics.
Owuna made the disclosure last Wednesday in Calabar during the recruitment interview of prospective officers into various positions for the commencement of the Life Niger Delta (ND) Project for the state in Calabar.
The Life ND Project is a partnership between the Federal Government, NDDC and IFAD to ensure food security and enhance job creation for youths and women in the Niger Delta region.
The commissioner said that the programme would not be like the usual political appointments because it was an intervention put together by different stakeholders to empower residents in agriculture for food sufficiency in the nation.
“All the stakeholders having met and seen Cross River as one of the states leading in agricultural revolution thought it necessary for the interview to hold on June 28 and June 29 in the state to support our agribusiness development.
“The programme is not just an incentive but comes as a form of empowerment to support the growth and development of agriculture in our rural communities and nation at large,” he said.
Similarly, National Coordinator of the project, Mr Abiodun Sani, said the interview and recruitment exercise would be transparent.
“Ordinarily, you would have expected people to be selected without consideration of due process but failure of any project starts from the beginning when you don’t get the right people to man it.
“We also have systemic checks to ensure that things flow normally and all the challenges associated with project failure are mitigated,” he said.
In his remark, Director, Project Coordinating Unit, Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Dr Bright Watergire, said the project was meant to be implemented in the nine states of the Niger Delta region; six of the states to be funded by IFAD while the remaining three by NDDC.
“The project has lost time in terms of implementation. So, there is a need to fast track and get the staff of Cross River on board to quickly commence the implementation of the project in order to achieve the desired objectives,” he said.
The Tide reports that some of the positions to be filled included: State Project Coordinator, State Agribusiness Promotion Officer and others.
The recruitment would be supervised by all stakeholders involved, while appointment was subject to the approval of the governor.