Bayelsa Govt. partners women engineers in infrastructural development
…to encourage Women participation in project execution
Bayelsa state Deputy Governor, Senator Lawrence Ehwrudjakpo has said the present administration would partner the Association of Professional Women Engineers in the area of infrastructural development.
He stated this on Wednesday, when he received in audience, the state chapter of the Association of Professional Women Engineers led by its Vice Chairperson, Mrs. Ifiemi Tulagha-Ocholi in Government House, Yenagoa.
Senator
Ehwrudjakpo assured that, government would also encourage contractors
to engage and utilise relevant home based women professionals as a way
of boosting local content participation.
The Deputy Governor
noted engineers were critical to societal development and enjoined them
to spread their tentacles to other parts of the world.
According to him, the crop of female engineers in the state have the experience and capacity to compete favourably with their peers and urged them to bring their expertise to bear on the development of the state.
He enjoined the female engineers to open a channel of communication with the Ministry of Works and Infrastructure and contractors, who would require their wealth of experience, skills and competence in relevant areas of jobs.
He said: “We will encourage our contractors to engage our female engineers who are not employed.
We are going to have an open channel of communication as we get contractors to work on site. The state government will insist that as part of quota system when they want to get their local content in terms of engineers, they should not bring their women from outside, rather they should encourage our women in supervision.
I encourage you to use yourselves as a positive role model to those looking up to you”
In her remarks, the Vice Chairperson of the Association of Professional Women Engineers, Mrs. Ifiemi Tulagha-Ocholi said women have distinguished themselves in a male dominated field as engineering, in spite of seeming odds.
She explained that the association encourages women engineers to succeed as well as make the desired progress in their careers, while also assisting engineering students in tertiary institutions to acquire practical skills.
Mrs. Tulagha-Ocholi hinted that the association’s programmes are geared towards employing, retaining and advancing female engineers through career services, professional development and networking both locally and internationally.
She used the occasion to call on the state government to invest in women and girl-child education, especially in Science and Engineering while considering the input of women in various fields of engineering to solve developmental challenges.
