Mr David Anyaele, Special Assistant to the Governor on Persons With Disabilities (PWDs), in Abia, has commended the National Orientation Agency (NOA) for including PWDs in its peace advocacy campaign amongst the citizenry.
He made the commendation when the Abia State Directorate of NOA paid a courtesy visit to his office in Umuahia on Wednesday.
Anyaele said that NOA’s visit was a deliberate effort aimed at ensuring that PWDs were included in its activities.
He explained that inclusion to the disability community meant participation of PWDs in order to ensure that they and their families benefitted from information.
Anyaele, who said he had worked closely with NOA as an activist, described the agency as the highest vehicle for dissemination of information in the country.
He said that peace is of paramount importance to PWDs because “where there is no peace it causes more disabilities.”
According to him, where there is no peace, it causes more disabilities and all of us are vulnerable.
“Your project on building a people of peace is quite commendable.
“Building the capacity and capabilities of PWDs to understand peace and be able to speak to their stakeholders is another way of saying that the campaign for building a people of peace will be sustained,” he said.
The special assistant assured that Gov. Alex Otti would support every effort that would support peace in the society.
He urged everyone to rise against all manner of abuses as a result of some individuals who were trying to manipulate the society through misinformation and disinformation.
Anyaele, therefore, promised to reach out to PWDs in the state, to ensure that they participated in all the programmes of NOA as well as ensure that the campaign was successful.
Earlier, the State Director of NOA, Mrs Regina Iroha, said was that the directorate was embarking on advocacy visit to major stakeholders tagged “Building a People of Peace.”
Iroha said it it was a sustained programme of NOA in the country in trying to ensure peaceful co-existence among citizenry.
She said: “We know that PWDs should not be left out in our search for an enduring peaceful co-existence among the people of this nation because they are part and parcel of the citizenry.
“This programme, we are trying to build peace, focussing on the negative effects of misinformation, disinformation, fake news and false news.
“We want to talk to people on how to go redefining news or information, more especially on social media.
“NOA is trying to ensure that PWDs know how to verify news and have access to authenticate information.”
