By Rose Oranye
Anambra State Commissioner for Information, Dr Law Mefor, yesterday October 5, 2024, joined other partners to celebrate this year’s National Day of Older Persons at the Awka City Stadium.
The event, with the theme, ‘Celebrating the Value of Older Persons and the Integral Role They Play in Community and Recognition of People and Places Who Remove the Barriers,’ was organized by Anambra State Ministry of Special Duties, in collaboration with the National Senior Citizens Centre (NSCC) National Stakeholders Consultative Forum on Ageing (NNSCFOA) and Alzheimer’s Disease Foundation (ADF).
Speaking in an interview shortly after the walk to mark the event, Dr Mefor stated that Anambra is working on policies to carry older persons along and take care of them to elongate their life expectancy and that of Ndị Anambra in general.
“The civilization of any society is best measured in the way and manner they treat their aged, the vulnerable ones and persons living with disabilitiez and Soludo is aware of this. His government is committed and paying special attention to these segments, including the senior citizens, those living with disabilities and the poorest of the poor.
“Soludu’s Government attaches so much importance to inclusive government and that is why the government has policies and programmes aimed at making life easier for the aged and many of these plans are already yielding fruits. We have old people in Anambra State. We try to carry them along. They need to be taken care of and the Government believes that there’s a need to put in place a kind of structure that will look at this policy of carrying along the old people, persons living with disabilities and the vulnerable generally.
“I’m aware that a committee has been put in place by the Soludo Government to work out a holistic plan to do this. They are contemplating the possibility of Old People’s Home(s) as the case may be. Several other interventions have been put in place and are also being implemented by the Soludo Government in this regard,” he said.
Oranye is of the Ministry of Information, Anambra State
