The Rivers State Commissioner for Information and Communications, Pastor Paulinus Nsirim has called on the people of the state to shun detractors whose stock in trade is to demarket the state.
Nsirim, who made the call when he appeared on a live radio phone-in programme, yesterday, organised by Multimesh Communications, operators of LOVE FM, in Port Harcourt, urged people of the state to join hands with Governor Nyesom Wike to build a new Rivers State.
“Let us join hands with Governor Nyesom Wike to build this new Rivers State because he is enthusiastic to make Rivers State a destination of choice and investors’ haven. He can do that if we collectively support him,” he said.
He said Wike has, in the last six years, demonstrated commitment to the execution of the NEW Rivers Vision blueprint configured to address the issues of education, healthcare, sports development, agriculture and rural development, women empowerment, among others, which he envisioned on assumption of office in 2015.
“We have a patriotic man who loves his state with all his heart. Governor Wike doesn’t want to play to the gallery about the development of Rivers State.
“He has promised Rivers people he will continue executing projects until he hands over in May, 2023. Such a character is rare to find in Nigerian governance.
“Governor Wike is bequeathing a new legacy for politics in Nigeria, to say to people not to abandon the people half way if given a mandate for the second tenure,” he said.
He said Wike’s dexterity in the execution of legacy projects in his second tenure is not to play to the gallery but to leave a legacy for posterity “because you see, often times people just come to public office without knowing that a day of reckoning will come.”
He emphasised that the governor wants to set the standard where he will leave the Brick House and walk tall the streets of Port Harcourt being heralded as a man who came and gave governance a new meaning.
“I can say without fear of contradiction that considering the infrastructural revolution currently witnessed in the state within the limits of available resources, Governor Wike has made every Rivers man proud,” he said.
Speaking on the 5,000 jobs, he said that names of applicants who applied for the jobs advertised by the Rivers State Government for placement in the civil service would soon be made public.
He said, “Very soon, the Rivers State Civil Service Commission will publish names and the results of the applications”.
Nsirim added, “The challenge is that the applications need to be sifted but I assure that applicants will be given a fair ground.”
The commissioner said there was no need for people to lose hope as the governor does not make pronouncements of things he cannot fulfill, hence the citizenry need to be patient.
He used the opportunity to dismiss claims that the state government has not given priority attention to human capital development.
According to him, since the governor came on board, no fewer than 3,000 persons have been employed in the various government agencies.
Nsirim, among others, cited the employment of lecturers and non-academic staff in the Rivers State University, adding that, “When the governor came on board, he reinstated the 500 lecturers disengaged by the last administration in the state university.”
In addition to that, he stated that the three new satellite campuses of the state university at Ahoada, Etche will also employ services of the people, as he noted that the various scholarships for medical and legal students are all part of human capital development policies of the Wike-led administration.
Reacting to the dilapidated state of the Igbo-Etche Road, the state image maker said that it was being looked into currently.
“This government is a listening administration, and it responds to the cries of the people,” he assured.
The commissioner stated that the infrastructure transformation of the Wike administration was to ensure that the city meets future challenge and does not implode as experienced in Lagos.

By: Kevin Nengia