The government of Senator Prof Ben Ayade is doing a lot right now to clean Cross River State, especially Calabar as a whole that has been in the news all over the country. We were with the Governor when he came out from the Airport, he went straight through the entire streets of Calabar to check the dump stands; how well the bins are being picked up to ensure that Calabar was clean. And right now you can agree with us clearly that Calabar is becoming very clean again.
For being so active and creative, Calabar Reporters met with the Director General, DG, of the Cross River State Primary Health Care Development Agency, CRSPHCDA, Dr. Betta Edu on how she came out with the Clean Calabar Programme to engage the Youths and support the Government to help make Cross River a better place.
Dr. Betta said to her, going about bringing young volunteers to go into the streets and support what Government is doing is not because government is not doing well, but to give out what she’s being doing since she’d lived a of volunteering right from her childhood.
Dr. Edu gave an instance that, in 2009 when she went to Atkinson in the United States, she volunteered to clean up the community, assist the Mentally Challenged People Programme. And in her words: “I didn’t volunteer because Atkinson didn’t have close to the second or the best waste management system in the United State. I didn’t volunteer because there weren’t picking their waste, neither did I volunteer at the Mentally Challenged People home because they didn’t have doctors or nurses or health care people to take care of them.
“That wasn’t the reason why I volunteered; I volunteered because as a young person, I have an obligation to give support to government structures wherever I find myself. And that is the actual spirit and culture I want to be able to build amongst young people in Cross River State.
“I see myself as a young person who is supposed to influence other young people in the right path. Those things were done in Atkinson and we taught nobody was looking at it, but at the end of the day when I was living Atkinson, I was awarded by the Governor of Atkinson as an Ambassador of the state of Atkinson which I still have the certificate in my house as I speak.”
Dr. Betta Edu also added that; that has opened other doors for her and that she wasn’t paid for volunteering. “But right now if call young people to join clean up the state, to come out and support government structures for health care or others, they’ll ask you how much will you give to them. What do I supposed to gain from doing it? They don’t see it as an opportunity to help make an impact in the society, they don’t see it as an opportunity to be able to tell another person tomorrow that I volunteered to do this or that. They don’t. This is so bad for me.
“So, what I’m actually trying to do is that; one, to give support to government structures which is already doing very well and secondly, to ensure that I can imbibe in young people a culture of volunteering.”
Come join Dr. Betta Edu, Calabar Reporters, Hit FM Calabar and many other bodies to keep Calabar Clean.
Date: July 21st, 2016
Venue: Watt Market Roundabout, Calabar
Time: 10:00am prompt.
See you there…!