By Frank Ulom
The Active Citizens Engaging the Legislature (Leg’ACEs) has elected Efio-Ita Nyok, a journalist from Cross River and Publisher of Negroid Haven as its National Coordinator.
Nyok assumed the leadership of the national caucus of the community in the company of two others, namely, Deborah Obiabo (National Deputy Coordinator of North/FCT Caucus Coordinator of the OPN Leg’ACEs) and Ukeme Anwan the National Deputy Coordinator of South/Akwa Ibom Caucus Coordinator of OPN Leg’ACEs via an election which held on Friday, June 30, 2023. Their tenure will last for one year.
While notifying the community of Leg’ACEs, Temidayo Taiwo-Sidiq the Senior Programme Executive of OrderPaper Nigeria, said “As part of reform measures to infuse a breath of fresh ideas into the Active Citizens Engaging the Legislature (Leg’ACEs) Programme, we are pleased to formally announce the election of national leadership for the National Caucus of the Leg’ACEs at a Special Meeting of the Zonal and State Caucus Leaders yesterday.
“National Coordinator: Efio-Ita Nyok,
Deputy National Coordinator (DNC) North: Deborah Obiabo, Deputy National Coordinator (DNC), South: Anwan Ukeme Archibong.
“With great pleasure, OrderPaper congratulates these leaders on their well-deserved election and is confident that they will galvanise the Leg’ACEs Community towards greater heights.”
The new national leadership also comprises Rabo Michael who is the
National Chief Whip and Coordinator of the OPN Leg’ACEs in Nasarawa, and Effiong Innocent the Deputy National Chief Whip.
In an address before the election, the Executive Director of Order Paper, Oke Epia said that two of the areas of concern for the Leg’ACEs is for the programme to aim at opening up the civic space in Nigeria view of facilitating engagement by the citizenry to demand quality public service from the national and state assemblies; as well as developing the best way to interact with the House of Assemblies.
The Leg’ACEs initiative was created to fulfil the mandate of bridging the gap between citizens and parliament, the objectives of the community are to explore co-creation opportunities with stakeholders in furtherance of parliamentary reporting and education and activate the agency of responsible citizenship to promote accountability from legislators.
Order Paper is Nigeria’s leading policy think tank and media group that aspires to bridge the gap between the citizenry and parliament. As a media body, she has been dedicated to reporting, tracking, analysing and archiving activities of the Nigerian legislature in the digital age with a vision of being a parliamentary reporting, advocacy and public policy advisory in Africa, and a vision of providing simple and ‘authoritative parliamentary data that empowers citizens to take action’.