{"id":83169,"date":"2026-03-18T10:08:44","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T10:08:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=83169"},"modified":"2026-03-18T10:08:44","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T10:08:44","slug":"benue-approves-n450m-women-project-fund-pilgrimage-sponsorship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2026\/03\/18\/benue-approves-n450m-women-project-fund-pilgrimage-sponsorship\/","title":{"rendered":"Benue Approves N450m Women Project Fund, Pilgrimage Sponsorship"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Samson Adeyanju<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Benue State Executive Council, chaired by Governor Hyacinth Iormem Alia, has approved the payment of \u20a6450 million as counterpart funding for the Nigeria Women Project, alongside the sponsorship of pilgrims to holy lands.<\/p>\n<p>The decision was reached at the council meeting held in Benue, according to a statement issued by the Technical Adviser to the Governor on Media, Publicity and Strategic Communication, Solomon Iorpev.<\/p>\n<p>The Nigeria Women Project, supported by the World Bank, is designed to empower women in the state through small and medium-scale enterprises, with the goal of reducing poverty and stimulating economic growth.<\/p>\n<p>The state\u2019s counterpart funding is expected to unlock additional financial support from the global institution for full implementation.<\/p>\n<p>In a related development, the council approved the sponsorship of 81 Muslim pilgrims to Mecca for this year\u2019s pilgrimage, with assurances that Christian pilgrims will receive similar support for trips to Jerusalem when due.<\/p>\n<p>The initiative, the government said, signals a renewed commitment to pilgrimage sponsorship in the state, a practice it noted had been neglected by previous administrations but is now being revived under the current leadership.<\/p>\n<p>The council also endorsed an executive order renaming the Benue Printing and Publishing Corporation after late media icon Dan Agbese, in recognition of his contributions to Nigeria\u2019s media industry.<\/p>\n<p>Council members commended Agbese\u2019s legacy of professionalism and dedication, urging young people to emulate his values and commitment to hard work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Samson Adeyanju The Benue State Executive Council, chaired by Governor Hyacinth Iormem Alia, has approved the payment of \u20a6450 million as counterpart funding for the Nigeria Women Project, alongside the sponsorship of pilgrims to holy lands. The decision was reached at the council meeting held in Benue, according to a statement issued by the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":83170,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83169"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83171,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83169\/revisions\/83171"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}