Why Sun nominated Uduaghan as Man of the Year – Adesina

The Delta State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan, has dedicated his 2013 Sun Man of the Year Award to Deltans.
According to Uduaghan, the award was “an honour to Deltans”, noting that the award ought to have been given to the state as: “Delta: State of the year award.”
Speaking on Sunday when he received the Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief of the Sun newspaper, Femi Adesina, in Asaba, the governor expressed happiness that what his administration was doing to better the lives of Deltans were being appreciated.
He observed that his administration places more emphasis on social service delivery of programmes that impact directly on human capital development as against projects that easily catch the attention of the people and publicity stunts.
He said it was far more important for him and the administration to meet the people at the point of their needs.
“In particular, this award poses more of challenge to improve further the reduction of infant and maternal mortality rate in the state,” Uduaghan said, disclosing that the Delta Beyond Oil initiative of his administration, to a large extent, was positioning Deltans to look at different sources of revenue other than oil.
Adesina had told the governor that he was in the state to officially inform him of the award by the Sun newspaper.
He stated that the award was given to Uduaghan because he has ensured that Delta State is the first state in the country to have met with the United Nation’s Millenium Development Goal 5, which is the reduction of infant mortality rate.
He said: “The Sun Board of Editors voted your Excellency in recognition of the remarkable transformation your administration has brought to bear on education, health, aviation, public infrastructure and utility sectors in Delta State.
“Most notably among your avalanche of achievements were when Delta came to the limelight on the African continent as the first state to attain goal number five of the Millenium Development Goals by reducing high mortality rate to as low as 224 deaths per 100,000 births as at 2012 and your paradigm shift programme designed to reposition the state from the age-long total dependence on oil to a beehive of integrated multi-economic activities.
“It is the uncommon but silent effort of your government to improve the quality of living among your people that the Sun deemed it appropriate to celebrate Your Excellency.”
Adesina said the award ceremony will take place at a later date.