NYSC BAGS UN AWARD

The National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme has bagged a UN award for its active participation in a recent offline survey conducted by the international body. Alhaji Abdulwahab Obomeile, the Director, Community Development Service and Special Projects Department of the corps,made the disclosure on Monday in Abuja at the award ceremony. He said that the award; ``My World: A Global Survey For Citizens’’, was an initiative from the UN, which is an options survey carried out through creative Online and Offlinemethods. ``It allows people across the world to tell the UN in particular and the Secretary-General’s High Level Panel, the most important issues they would like the Post-2015 agenda to address after the expiration of MDGs agenda,’’ he said.

He added that the NYSC in Nigeria, using the Corps Volunteers of NYSC MDGs Advocacy Programme, was actively engaged in the offline survey, which took place across the country in March. ``We partnered with the UN Millennium Campaign Nigeria, OSSAP-MDGs and CISLAC, and engaged over 1,000 youth corps members as field volunteers to administer the questionnaires in the 774 local government areas in Nigeria,’’ he added. He said the survey was structured to capture two persons per 100 households in each of the 774 local government areas.

``The total number of the votes came to 145,672 citizens, 67.2 percent of which were rural dwellers, 45.5 percent were youths and 46.5 werefemale. ``It is worthy of note that some of these areas face security challenges and cultural barriers where women are not allowed to express themselves, but the Field Volunteers worked around these situations,’’ he said.

Obomeile saluted the resilience and hard work of the corps members who remained committed and resolute in carrying out the exercise within five days. Also speaking, Hilary Ogbonna, the National Coordinator, UN Millennium Campaign, Nigeria,said the MDGs had made a huge impact on the lives of many Nigerians.``But there is still much more to be done to address extreme poverty,diseases and environmental crises among many others,’’ he said.

Responding, the NYSC Director General, Brig.-Gen. Nnamdi Okore-Affia, said he was most excited to receive the award on behalf of the NYSC. ``I am dedicating this award to Mr President, the Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces, NYSC Staff and the entire corps members nationwide, who worked assiduously to merit this award,’’ he said.

Source-NANS