Lawrence Nwimo, Awka
Anambra residents who benefited from the free Insecticide Treated Nets (ITNs) mass campaign by Malaria Consortium have called on government to adopt use of technological devices in distribution of resources in the state.
Respondents bared their minds in separate interviews with Ikengaonline, during a visit to fast check how the ITNs distribution was executed across the 21 Local Government Areas in Anambra state.
Malaria Consortium, an International Non-governmental Organisation, had embarked on free distribution of 3.8 million ITNs across the 21 Local Government Areas of the state, a measure aimed at eliminating the malaria scourge.
The material was shared on a door-to-door basis to the residents by trained personnel of the group.
The donation came from GiveWell Open Philanthropic Funding with support from Anambra State Government and National Malaria Elimination Programme (NMEP).
Mrs Grace Onukwube from Mgbaku said, she was surprised and happy to receive four nets for her households in spite of the fact that she had nobody in government.
“When the distributors entered our compound and said they came to share nets, I expressed mixed feelings within me.
“First I was frightened that the people were on a mission unknown and I told them that I do not belong to any political party and why me.
“They told me that the gesture was donation from an NGO and that they had a device checking their work.
“It was after the group had left that I was able to pin their sincerity to the fear of the device exposing their activities that made them to abide by the rules,” Onukwube said.
She therefore encouraged governments at all levels to borrow a leaf from Malaria Consortium in the deployment of technological device used in the sharing of certain democracy dividends.
Mrs Uju Okwa, Linus Ndukwe and Vitus Okafor from Obeledu, Akwaeze and Urum respectively corroborated the views of Onukwube, saying that the seamless distribution was a departure from the old order.
“We have had previous cases of mass distribution of materials by governments but none has gotten to many like the ITNs mass campaign by Malaria Consortium and the difference is due to the use of the device which checkmated primitive diversions.
“The field workers were afraid that the device could expose negative activities they perform in the course of the distribution and for that most of them respected their rules of engagement,” Okafor said.
Ms Jean-Frances Williams, Training and Technology Administrator (TTA), in Awka North, said the devices were very effective in tracking the activities of field workers.
She said that the devices rarely give problem to the users during operations, saying, if it logs out during mobilization of a household, all you have to do is to re-scan it all over and within seconds it starts functioning.
Imam Ologolo Ahmed, Head of Information Communication Technology, Malaria Consortium, ITNs Campaign, Anambra State said the device deployed was one of the best for accountability and efficiency for Mass distribution of items to large settlements.
“The device is Samsung A12 with “Redrose Application,” it is used to capture the data of each household visited; their names, family size to determine number of nets to be given to the household.
“It enabled the team to ensure health talk was given to the households on the use and care for nets.
“Other function is that it gives us real time data for tracking and reducing fraudulent activity in the field, because we can track, trace and capture all households and how many number of nets given through the device,” Ahmed said.
The head of ICT of the group added that the device equally reduces the stress of using paper on the field which might be cumbersome to carry, noting that in many developed nations the device is used for mass distribution of materials.
