The Omu-Aran Development Association (ODA) has commended Landmark University, Omu-Aran, for its efforts at improving the well-being of the people through the institution’s Community Development Impact Initiative (LMCDII). The President of ODA, Chief Peter Oyinloye, made the commendation during a town-hall meeting in Omu-Aran, Irepodun local government area of Kwara.

Oyinloye said the institution, since inception five years ago, had in no small measure been alive to its corporate social responsibility to the community. He said the institution's renewed effort through the recently introduced LMUCDII, which aimed at impacting on the socio-economic wellbeing of the people, was highly commendable.

According to him, some of the initiatives embarked on by LMUCDII are the periodic organisation of counselling initiatives for some secondary school students. The president said the initiative was to assist in the students' future academic pursuits and was a good pointer to the institution's kind gesture.

"It is on record that the LMUCDII team had visited Oke-Igbala Leprosy Medical Centre; Inioluwa and Hope Orphanage where lots of food items and other materials were donated to the inmates.

"The institution, through the initiative, is presently in partnership with Omu-Aran Youth Forum as parts of its agrarian revolution drive.

"This, in essence, is geared towards making agriculture more attractive to the youth as a trade and as a vocation," Oyinloye said. He noted that the university had proved to be a major employer of labour within the senatorial district with more than 5,000 skilled and unskilled labourers, comprising both indigenes and non-indigenes on its pay-roll.

The ODA president, who particularly commended the institution's chancellor, Bishop David Oyedepo, for his foresight, pledged the community's support for the institution's agrarian project.

He urged other well meaning individuals and organisations to emulate Oyedepo's philanthropic gestures. "We, the Omu-Aran community under his royal highness, the Olomu of Omu-Aran, Oba Charles Ibitoye, and his chiefs, express our appreciation for this development drive," Oyinloye said.

The LMUCDII Chairman, Pastor Abiodun Okunola, reiterated the institution's commitment to continued execution of programmes and policies aimed at adding value to the well-being of the people.

Okunola disclosed that the arrangement had been concluded on the institution's three-day free healthcare services across the institution's medical outposts, markets, churches and mosques in Omu-Aran.

He said the free healthcare services which include free tests, diagnoses, treatment and drugs for different ailments such as malaria, hypertension and diabetes, was targeted at about 5,000 beneficiaries.