Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River state has unveiled plans to partner with TL First Group in building capacity and transforming rural communities in the state.

This was made known in Calabar by the Deputy Governor of the state, Professor Evara Esu, during a meeting with the Commissioner of Rural Transformation, Mr. Sunday Ikwen Archunekang, and the GMD of TL First Group, Dr. Olu Olasode.

The Governor said the state is poised to developing human capacity across its public civil services through the partnership. He confirmed that needs assessment visit will now begin across the different rural communities to identify intervention programmes that will be required to stimulate rural economic development.

According to him, there will be feasibility reports on required areas of possible intervention which will be provided and made available to potential donors and partners with the view to obtaining donor support into the programmes. In this regards, the deputy governor noted the mandate of Cross River State Department of International Donor in engaging with potential donors that will provide support to the interventions and rural transformation programmes. The state is also carrying out training needs analysis across its ministries, departments and parastatals with the support of TL First.