Poverty Alleviation: Oyo Govt ‘Has Touched Over 1m Families – Commissioner

*Targets 2m indigent family units

By; BAYO AKAMO, Ibadan

Oyo State Commissioner for Women Affairs and Social Inclusion, Mrs Toyin Balogun on Wednesday, said that 1.13 million indigent families have benefitted from the state government Poverty alleviation scheme.

Mrs Balogun stated this at the Omituntun 2.0 Inter-Ministerial Briefing held at the Governor’s Office Briefing Room, Secretariat, Agodi, Ibadan.

The commissioner declared that the ministry has been working hard to bring to reality Governor ‘Seyi Makinde’s vision of taking the people of Oyo State from poverty to prosperity.

According to Mrs Balogun, the ministry set for itself the target of impacting two million indigent family units, and that with the various interventions from the Ministry, it had achieved over 50 per cent of the target.

She maintained that her ministry’s interventions have impacted 1.13 million indigent families so far, and that 70 per cent of the interventions including conditional cash transfer and financial assistance from the Ministry have targeted both the male and the female demographics.

“In the last two years and a few months of Omituntun 2.0, not only have we fulfilled the broad mandate of His Excellency to lift our people from poverty to prosperity, we have also achieved a number of successes across areas of our core mandate. And, we will continue to be so committed till the end of the timeline of this government to ensure that we are able to fulfill our promises”, she said.

Mrs Balogun added “We gave ourselves a minimum target of two million indigent family units. So far, from all the various interventions of the Ministry of Women Affairs and Social Inclusion, we have been able to positively impact about 1.13 million indigent family units”.

“So, I think we are well on course to meet or even possibly surpass the target that we have assigned to ourselves”.

The Commissioner stressed that the government would not relent until the governor’s vision is fully achieved, saying the Ministry has also achieved various successes including gender mainstreaming, contributing towards the reduction of out-of-school children, addressing gender-based violence and evaluating/settling destitute in the society, among other areas.

Mrs Balogun stressed that her Ministry was resolutely opposed to the sale of babies through government-owned or private orphanages, vowing to bring the full weight of the law to bear on culprits.