NOA Vows To Reach Out To Over 100m Nigerians In Nationwide Enlightenment Campaign

By; IBRAHIM ADAMU, Kaduna

National Orientation Agency (NOA) has flagged off third quarter nationwide enlightenment campaign 2025 with a vow to reach out 111 million Nigerians via media engagements, town hall meetings, market and motor park rallies.

This leg of the sensitization campaign would focus on key issues on the front burner, requiring clarification, especially government policies aimed at providing succour to citizens and how they could access the programmes, according to Director General of NOA Lanre Issa-Onilu.

Addressing a press conference in Kaduna the DG, represented by a director of the agency Olubukola Olurunfemi highlighted items which the nationwide awareness campaign would focus on in the following weeks to include; National Values Re-orientation, National Security Awareness Measures, Adherence to Right Attitudes in handling national symbols, National Youth Investment Fund, Flood and Disaster Preparedness and management among others.

Issa-Onilu said the NOA as an agency saddled with core mandate and responsibilities of enlightening the public on government policies and programmes and mobilizing citizens towards achieving needed goals for national growth and development would not relent in its duty of sensitizing the populace, especially on masses-centred programmes under the current administration’s Renewed Hope Agenda for the benefit of students, entrepreneurs, traders and the general public.

He said the agency would be rolling out campaigns aimed at targetting three million Nigerians in each state of the federation, including the FCT to keep the public abreast of government policies and how best citizens could contribute their quota toward making the country better and more prosperous for the present and future generation.

In his speech the NOA Boss called on students in public tertiary institutions to utilize the federal government education loan grants, accessible digitally, adding that over 59 billion naira had been disbursed under the scheme to over 600, 000 beneficiaries paid directly to their leaning institutions.

Cash and renewed hope infrastructure and fund had also been disbursed under social safety net expansion programme, according to Issa-Onilu, which he pointed out would go a long way in alleviating economic hardship and improve standard of living of citizens.

He revealed that in 2024 alone, each state of the federation had accessed three billion naira for flood and disaster preparedness and management to enable drainage clearance and relocation.

Speaking on security, he stated that the Chief of Defence Staff General Chris Musa had directed establishment of specialized units of armed forces across the nation for rapid response to tackle diverse security challenges, adding that drone, armoured vehicle surveillance technologies, including the deployment of 15,000 security personnel to provide security for lives and property had been achieved.

He decried the trending practice by school leavers and graduands of elaborate and extreme jamborees, including signing of shirts on inappropriate areas of the female body, describing the act as alien to Nigeria’s culture of conservation, decency and moral high value.

The agency head stressed the need for traditional, religious and community leaders to mount sustained advocacy to instil high moral values people at the grassroots so that the society would be an ideal place for all.

Learning of the National Anthem and strict respect and adherence to right attitude in treating symbols such as the naira, Nigeria’s flag, passport among others, would also form basis for the NOA’s mass campaign, according to Issa-Onilu.