Editor
…Lifts Her With N200k
ZENITH Labour Party (ZLP) candidate in the Anambra governorship election, Dr. Obiora Okonkwo, could not hold back his tears after a starving nursing mother, Amara Nwachukwu, who hawks sachet water, collapsed before him at Ndida Market in Okpoko, Onitsha, where he had gone to flag off a road contract he awarded to ease movement in the area.
Join our WhatsApp ChannelMrs Nwachukwu, who had her baby strapped to her back, was rushing to buy a bag of sachet water, which sells for N200, when she collapsed under the weight of hunger.
Nwachukwu lost her balance and collapsed onto dirty and muddy road of the market in the vicinity of St. Charles Lwanga Catholic Church.
After regaining consciousness, she told Okonkwo and his running mate, Dame Jessie Balonwu, that her last meal was a soaked garri which she and her baby consumed on Monday night.
She said that she was struggling to see if she could sell a bag of sachet water to enable her buy some food for herself and her baby. Moved to tears by the woman’s plight, Dr. Okonkwo, who ensured that she was immediately revived and fed with a quick meal, also gave her a cash gift of N200, 000 to enable her start-up a trade.
The ZLP candidate also asked priests at the Catholic Church to move the deeply emaciated woman and her baby to St. Charles Borromeo hospital for a comprehensive health check, promising to pay the bill.
The gesture threw the market community into a frenzy as the market women who witnessed the development prayed to God for more blessings on Okonkwo.
Addressing journalists after the road construction flag-off exercise, Okonkwo said it was unthinkable that anyone in Anambra state would go to bed hungry.
He expressed confidence that the story of the majority of Anambra people would change for good with a ZLP government led by him.
His words, “What we have done here today is not about politics but about our common humanity. It is simply a continuation of what we have been doing and which we will continue to do election or no election.”
