By Kazeem Bisiriyu & Ibrahim Bakare
Ondo State First Lady, Betty Anyanwu-Akeredolu, has organised a training for town criers within the old Mbato autonomous community on the coronavirus pandemic.
The old Mbato community now comprises five autonomous communities namely Emeabiam, Umuokpo, Eziobodo, Eziokele and Okolochi.
Mrs Anyanwu-Akeredolu is the Ada Emeabiam II of Emeabiam Autonomous Community, Owerri West LGA, Imo State.
The training, she said, was necessitated by the low awareness of the deadly COVID-19 disease at the rural areas, which exposes a lot of lives to the danger of being affected by the disease.
Speaking at Ahannanyereugo Villa, Umuikea Emeabiam, venue of the training, Akeredolu emphasised that there was need for town criers, who are foot soldiers and information custodians, to be rightly informed on the outbreak, mode of transmission and the dos and don’ts, to remain safe during this pandemic.
She added that her effort was to complement government’s efforts for the citizens to be well informed with the right information to curtail the spread of the deadly virus.
The commissioned town criers, who were trained in their local dialect, expressed enthusiasm to carry out their duties effectively as it concerns the outbreak in order to save lives in their communities.
The town criers were trained on preventive measures such as social distancing, that is avoiding crowded places like church, mosque, wedding, burial, naming ceremony, market etc., staying at home, regular washing of hands with soap, the use of hand sanitisers, avoiding handshakes, avoiding overloading of passengers both by motorists and motorcyclists, and adopting respiratory hygiene, among others.
They were later encouraged to periodically raise awareness via local dialect in their various communities in the best interest of their people.