COVID 19: Mbaise Policy Roundtable activates Adopt-A-Village Initiative; Reaches out to widows, vulnerable persons

New York, April 12, 2020:
The Mbaise Policy Roundtable (MPR) has activated its “Adopt-A-Village Initiative (ADAVI),” aimed at alleviating hunger and other forms of hardship in rural communities due to the lockdown and other preventive measures occasioned by the coronavirus pandemic.
The MPR, which has offices in Owerri, Imo State and New York, USA held the first in the series of ADAVI events in the Amuzi community of Ahiazu Mbaise.
Described as “resoundingly successful”, in a statement signed by its Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Casca Ohanele, one of the events was coordinated by Barr Maxwell Opara and supported by Dozie and Chidinma Onwuliri, Chief Mike and Dr Nomso Opara and 35 others, from Umuokazi, a village in Amuzi.
The coordinators, according to the statement, raised close to N1 million and shared same among indigent citizens of the village, to assist them to buy food and medicines at this trying period. They also shared about 500 tablets of soap donated by one of them.
This, it said, was done a day after they had engaged and paid six trained health workers who moved from one house to another in the entire village to sensitize people on the preventive measures against COVID-19.
At two other ADAVI events which took place in Umuokisi, another village in Amuzi, Dr Mrs Ndidi Oparaoji and Lady Nwamaka Oparaoji put smiles on the faces of women of Umunweama na Dulu and widows of Umuokisi, numbering hundreds.
Dr Mrs. Oparaoji gave each of the women in her targeted group N5000 cash and food items, while Lady Nwamaka Oparaoji distributed food items such as garri, rice, beans and others to the Umuokisi widows. Lady Oparaoji also had on ground a healthcare practitioner who educated the attendees on the importance of obeying the stay-at-home order, hand washing, respiratory hygiene and social distancing.

Commenting on the events, the Chairman of MPR, the premier pre-eminent Mbaise Public Policy and Business Advisory Council in the World, Professor Edward Oparaoji , said “I am very comforted by the engagement of our members, and from the initial outcome of this initiative. I can now sleep better. Prior to now, imagining the hunger and hardship this stay at home remedy against COVID 19 would inflict on the most vulnerable members of our community kept me up at night. It is also very heartwarming to mention that what has just been reported is only a scratch at the surface, as a whole lot more of our members are already stepping forward with humanitarian gestures to help someone in need. That is the MPR spirit.”
The statement by Ohanele, which stressed that MPR focuses entirely on the development of Mbaise and Imo State, through the facilitation of financial, in-kind resources, private investments and private public partnerships encouraged members “to take the initiative to provide assistance to the most vulnerable members of their adopted village, as they deem appropriate, to help them scale through the tough times. These could mean offering cash, food, medical care, face masks, sanitizers, soaps, education and any other needed assistance they can provide.”
He noted further that “MPR is situated to liaise, partner, and/or collaborate with international entities, the Imo State Government and agencies, and the private sector to produce and advance policies that will fast track Mbaise and Imo State development to a first world status.”