PH Mundial – Port Harcourt Online Newspaper News Across The Region
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Swali community in Yenagoa council area of Bayelsa State now has a new community development committee (CDC) and youth leadership.
Sources who monitored the election of the new leadership of the town, noted for her commercial and economic importance to the state, reports that one-time chairman of the community’s development committee, Comrade Fidelix Ekpengba, has for a record two non-consecutive times been elected by the community’s electoral college as CDC helmsman.
Swali community plays host to Bayelsa’s largest daily market, the Swali Ultra Modern Market, headquarters of the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board, NCDMB as well as one of the foremost tourist delights in Yenagoa metropolis, the Oxbow Lake. Others include a foremost broadcast outfit, the Silverbird Group and National Inland Water Ways Authority (NIWA)
In spite of this, the community seems to be neglected by successive state governments as there are reportedly no social amenities, such as good roads, health care centre, pipe borne water, electricity and other infrastructures befitting a community within a state capital.
Our sources also report that Mr Appah Kieboye was elected as new youth president.
Speaking to newsmen after their election, the duo thanked the community for reposing confidence in them, assuring that they would not betray the trust.
Epkengba and Appah pledged commitment towards partnering with all well-meaning individuals and corporate bodies in and around the commercial town to better the lot of the community, noting that internal security, peaceful coexistence with non-indigenes and development would be their watchwords.
Meanwhile the paramount ruler of the community, HRH Seiyafa Wilcox, has said that the rationale behind the use of the collegiate system in electing occupants of the positions of the CDC chairman and youth president respectively was to avoid rancour, thereby reducing the chances of unqualified individuals in ascending leadership.
“The seamless process of conduct of the election in a peaceful and convivial manner demonstrated the fact that Swali Community looks up to those elected to navigate them through the intriguing challenges that lie ahead of them. As development can only thrive in areas devoid of rancor, where peace reigns”
According to the monarch, this system has partly been responsible for their continued peaceful living over the years in spite of neglect, and expressed the wish that other communities can emulate the peaceful process of electing community leaders without recourse to violence, brigandage and threats that have led to loss of lives and properties during similar elections in some Bayelsa communities in the past.
He advised the duo of the new CDC chairman and Youth leader not to derail from working harmoniously in the interest of the fast urbanising community, adding that they should ensure there is honesty, accountability and transparency which are the watch word of any leader that wants to excel.
