Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan has signed into law, ‘The Delta State Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency Bill’ to consolidate its micro credit activities targeted at the poor. Governor Uduaghan who signed the Bill yesterday in Asaba also, appointed Dr. Anthonia Ashiedu as its Executive Secretary.

He explained that the law became necessary to ensure the continuation of the micro credit programme which was beneficial to the lowest rungs of the society after his tenure in office.

Dr Uduaghan observed that his administration in line with its Delta Beyond Oil Initiative has carried out a lot of developmental activities targeted at the pro poor and the new agency would ensure the continuity of these activities.

According to him, “this bill is to ensure the protection of our micro credit programme for which we have put in a lot and is beneficial to the people at the lowest rungs in society, since 2007 a lot of our activities have been targeted at the pro poor, this enabled us to deal with the Delta Beyond oil at that level,” adding, “now we have an agency that will protect our micro credit activities”

Dr. Uduaghan stated that with the agency in place, the state could now access the Central Bank of Nigeria 220 billion naira micro credit, small and medium enterprises fund for the benefit of the people of the state, stressing that “the state has been identified as a major beneficiary of the fund giving our achievements in that sector”.

The Governor while saying that the agency would have a part time board and chairman, added that it would also have its own management structure headed by an Executive Secretary. He charged Dr. Ashiedu to ensure that Deltans benefit from the CBN fund immediately.

Earlier, the Speaker of the Delta State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Peter Onwusanya said the Bill passed through rigorous process before it was passed by the legislature and expressed the hope that the law would be beneficial to Deltans.

Source: Daily Times