Bauchi, World Bank to construct 1,000 rural access roads 

The Bauchi State Government in collaboration with the World Bank is to construct 1,000 rural access roads across the state.
Governor Mohammed Abubakar disclosed this at a dinner organised for the executive of the Nigerian Guild of Editors in Bauchi on Saturday night.
He said all arrangements had been concluded between the state government and the World Bank to construct the roads across the state.
Abubakar said: “The rural access road will enhance economic activities and development among the citizens and also improve the internally generated revenue of the state.
“It will also ease commercial movements and access from one rural markets to another and movements to urban towns across the state.”
According to him, the state government has already paid its N800 million counterpart fund to the World Bank.
He said that the bank was working out the modalities toward starting the projects.
‎He said his administration paid the counterpart fund religiously considering the importance of the projects to the citizens and the development of the state.
The governor also said that the state government had taken all the necessary measures to ensure sanity in the payment of gratuities to its retired workers.
He said: “We recently inaugurated a committee saddled with the responsibility of paying  gratuities to retired workers and mandated its members to invite all beneficiaries for physical verification and table payment.”
He said the measure became imperative in order to block all leakages in the payment and noted that, his administration had sustained the payment of salaries and pensions.
On the status of the Internally Generated Revenue in the state, Abubakar said the percentage had increased to 34 per cent with the adoption of technology and improvement in revenue collection.
Abubakar also said with the regular training of teachers and the  support of the World Bank, the lost glory of the education sector in the state had  been restored.
The governor said this had reflected in the excellent performance of its students in their examinations.
‎He added that to ensure adequate healthcare coverage in the state, his administration recently released N800 million as its counterpart funding to some international institutions.
On empowerment, the governor said over 50,000 women and youths were trained in various skills’ acquisition programmes to enable them become self-reliant.
‎The governor advised the leadership of the NGE to maintain the corporate image of the profession by ensuring professionalism in the discharge of their responsibilities.
Earlier, the president of guild, Funke Egbemode, had acknowledged the successes recorded by the administration of the governor.
She also expressed gratitude to him for ensuring the success of their meeting in the state.