Cosmas Chukwu
The Government of the United Kingdom has commended Governor Peter Mbah’s development strides in Enugu State, saying he is doing an excellent job across various sectors.
The UK Government also expressed its readiness to partner with the Government of Enugu State for the mutual benefits of both the state and UK, citing the longstanding bilateral ties between it and Nigeria.
The commendation was given by the British Deputy High Commissioner to Nigeria, Ms Gill Lever, during a working visit to the governor at the Government House Enugu on Wednesday.
Ms. Lever also pledged her government’s commitment to building the human capital of the Enugu State Civil Service in line with Governor Mbah’s effort to transition the state’s bureaucracy from manual to e-governance.
“I’m delighted to pay my very first visit to Enugu State. I met the governor this afternoon. We had a very robust and thoughtful discussion about a number of issues. I commended him on the excellent work he is doing in your state – on infrastructure, on water and sanitation, on health, on business, and indeed on security, all of which are interlinked.
“So, I think he is doing an excellent job in serving the state very well. We are very pleased to be partnering with the governor. We are looking for opportunities in mutual growth. We support his programmes.
“Our government and the Government of Nigeria are emphasising economic growth. So, we are very much in the business of looking for opportunities to support growth and development in Enugu State.
“We are also very pleased to be supporting a digital programme for civil servants. We have trained over 500 civil servants in digital skills with a view to aiding the vision of His Excellency, the governor, for civil servants to be better able to provide public services to the people of your state,” she stated.
In his remark, Mbah thanked the UK Government for all the support being accorded to his administration, especially in its effort to migrate to e-governance.
“The recent one is the digital access training given to over 500 of our civil servants. That is coming quite handy and at the right time because we are just on the verge of transitioning from the manual ways of doing things.
“Second is also the economic part of it where we are now able to enhance the quality of services we provide to the people of Enugu State. The other thing it does is the fact that we can also become more accountable to the people because we can capture our revenue accurately and also curb the incidences of revenue leakages, increasing what is available to us to spend.
“We are grateful because this is essentially coming at a time when we are thinking about how we’re going to make sure that all our civil servants are digitally compliant and they all are able to seamlessly use the portal.
“We have also talked about the technical support the Foreign Commonwealth Development Office, FCDO, has provided to the Enugu State Electricity Regulatory Commission. So, obviously, we are looking at other opportunities, other areas we can work with the UK Government and maybe specifically the FCDO,” Mbah stated.
Another highpoint of the British envoy’s visit was the presentation of certificates of completion to participants in the second edition of the Enugu Digital Literacy Skills Training Progtamme, a collaboration between the Enugu SME Centre, FCDO, and Tech4Dev, which supported civil servants in Enugu State with digital literacy skills.
