Nigerian youth corps members undergoing their national service at the Akwa State Orientation Camp of the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) have raised the alarm that the State Coordinator of the Scheme, Ekwe N. I. Chinyere, collected their phone numbers and threatened to punish them after reports showed how the corps members lamented that they were being poorly fed.
Reports flew that some of the corps members lamented the poor feeding in camp despite the Nigerian government’s increment of their feeding allowance.
The aggrieved corps members had exposed that the state coordinator and other officials allegedly forced bad meals on the corps members, necessitating most of them to spend their personal money buying food.
Eddy Megwa, the NYSC Director, Press and Public Relations in a recent statement on a related development had asserted that it was unfortunate to allege that a State Coordinator addressed corps members, encouraging them to leave the orientation camp, because of food shortage.
He had emphasised that camp markets were highly regulated, so as to prevent exploitation of Corps Members by the operators, noting that the markets were not insulated from the vagaries of inclement economic weather which was of global dimension.
After the story, a source disclosed that the State Coordinator, Chinyere, collected all the corps members’ phone numbers and set up a committee of about 25 corps members to counter the report.
“With regards to your story on 22/02/2024 about how NYSC Akwa Ibom Coordinator, Ekwe N. I. Chinyere is embezzling the feeding allowance of corps members, I want to tell you that the coordinator collected all the corps members’ phone numbers and threatened them with punishment.
“She also selected and gathered at least 25 corps members under the supervision of her boy, one senior officer, Mr. Umorin Kufre, to debunk the story to write a report against the news. The Coordinator also directed them to post it on social media,” the source said.
The source added that “Despite the fact that the PRO of NYSC in Akwa Ibom, Mr. Anselem wanted to join the group, the coordinator disgraced and sent him away.
“This group of corps members was selected and gathered yesterday at midnight at NYSC Akwa Ibom permanent orientation camp.”
The source further informed that the coordinator rushed to the camp store and picked gas cylinders, went out from the camp to buy gas instead of firewood that she had been forcing corps members to cut from the camp bush and take to the camp kitchen for cooking.
“She is trying to hide all what she has been doing for many years simply because she read the news today.
“There are evidences of how corps members are being forced to carry firewoods to the kitchen and cook food and in the process of cooking the food, they are inhaling dangerous smoke from the firewoods,” the source added.
According to the source, the coordinator recruited a few casual workers in the camp, hence, there were shortfalls in manpower and corps members were made to cook most of the time.
The source said that “A lot of them complained of the fire smoke they inhale while cooking but due to negligence in recruiting more casual workers, corps members have been subjected to hard labour including carrying of firewoods, selecting of palm fruits, offloading of goods/items brought to camp.”