Why I fight social ills, promote healthy living – Nonye Soludo

Wife of Governor Charles Soludo of Anambra State, Mrs Nonye Soludo, is passionate about healthy living, safe environment, positive lifestyles and proper upbringing of children. And that passion often drives her to speak to people on how to live a healthy, positive life whenever the opportunity calls.

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At a recent chat with select journalists at the Governor’s Lodge in Amawbia, Mrs Soludo, spoke on her journey so far in that direction. Saturday Sun’s OBINNA ODOGWU was there.

What is this Healthy Living with Nonye Soludo all about?

Healthy Living with Nonye Soludo is not something that started today. It’s been something I have been championing for over 10 years. I have been giving talks. In short, my business started by giving talks about healthy living lifestyles, mentoring people; you know; talking to people about what to eat, how to eat, how to incorporate fibre into their daily meals and so on. And questions kept coming. I kept sourcing for alternatives to what we have in the market that will help them live a healthy lifestyle. So, after some time I said to myself that I can, as I am helping others, do it as a business. And that’s how my business started – Healthy Living Foods Ltd. I have about 130 products in the market. They are all natural foods, with no preservatives in all of them. And that’s how it started. So, Healthy Living with Nonye Soludo is not something that I am just starting because I am the First Lady of Anambra State. I am just bringing it in here to talk to our people about how to live a healthy life. For me, for us to achieve a liveable and prosperous homeland, we must be healthy because health is wealth. That is the greatest wealth we can talk about. That is the greatest wealth I know. That’s why I am bringing it down home; making it a club in schools so that we catch them young. It is actually for everyone. Healthy living is for everybody but most especially for children, students, youths and women. Our mission is actually to mobilise everybody. We want to mobilise all the critical segments in society to make healthy living a culture. We want to make it a lifestyle. And with that, we can do a lot. Healthy Living with Nonye Soludo has so many segments. We have about six under it – nutrition, fitness, basic skills, environmental cleanliness and personal cleanliness. We are teaching the children to flee from drugs, cultism and other social ills. We teach them sex education for their self everything.

Coming to nutrition, for me, nutrition is everything. I really want to teach our people because they don’t know and I want to start teaching them, catching them young. I can talk from now till tomorrow about nutrition. Lifestyle, unfortunately, we are all in a hurry. We don’t really take care of what we put in our body. We go to shops, take the quick ones, put them into the microwaves and put them in our system. And it is killing us. That’s why I am teaching children now; teaching them in school, teaching the youths and mothers how to bring a simple product, turn it around and ask, what do we have in it? What am I actually putting in my system? What is it that I am eating? A lot of them are chemicals. You get a simple product, turn it and you see 35 ingredients in it. About 90 per cent of them, you don’t know what they are. Why do you put it in your system? When you’re confused about a particular product, this and that you don’t know; maybe you know one or two but yet you put it in your system; the system will be confused. The analogy I always use, some of us have our garbage dumps where we dump refuse in our houses. Some behind the houses, you keep dumping. Every rubbish you generate in your house, you dump there. A lot of things will go there to breed, to look for food. Rats, cockroaches, ants and others will always go there. But you go there and do certain things to get rid of them. But it’s just for a short period of time. They will go but after sometime, they will come back again. And you’ll start looking for how to deal with them. Until you get rid of the refuse dump and clean up the place, that’s the only time they will disappear completely. And it’s exactly what is happening in our body. If you keep on dumping rubbish, what you don’t know, chemicals, the poor organs will be suffering and every day, problems keep popping up. You go to the doctor; the doctor will give you medicine. Maybe, you will be well. It will suppress whatever is happening to you. You will continue eating rubbish and it keeps coming. Until you make conscious efforts to clean up your system and start eating well, our body is such a smart thing. Once you start making that conscious effort to eat well, it starts healing itself. That’s when all this will start going off. A lot of them will start disappearing. You start turning things around.

Over the years I have learnt that our food is so powerful. Our food is medicine, our food is healing, and it is energy. It is everything. Just give the body the real, nutritious, natural food and it will do wonders. Don’t abuse food. So, that’s what we want to teach our people. And it is not expensive to do. It is just serious orientation; teaching them how to start doing all these things behind their gardens; cultivating vegetables. Our people need to cut down on processed foods. There are loads of chemicals in them. Imagine the poor organs processing these chemicals. Instead of processing natural foods our awesome God gave us; process it, take out the ones the body needs and push out, now it is processing chemicals. That’s why the organs are suffering. So, that’s what I want to teach our people. Again, we want to teach them how to exercise. Exercise is another key to healthy living. Every day, make out time, maybe about 30 minutes or one hour. Thirty minutes is just two per cent of our day, just for your life. Wake up in the morning, you don’t need to register anywhere. Dance. Break out that sweat. If you imagine what you’re taking out from your body through that sweat; the toxins coming out of your body through the sweat every morning; a whole lot of things to do, do what you enjoy but you must work out. When you work out in the morning, when you start your day that way, the feel good factor, the energy throughout the day. It is a win-win anytime. So, we want to teach our children. When you see children and adults now, and you say to them; work out every day, they say that there is no time. But you have time to hold your phone, be on the internet doing rubbish sometimes. You have time to go to your neighbour’s house to gist. But that thing which will improve your life, you say that there is no time. It is just two per cent of your day. If you normally wake up by six in the morning, then wake up by 5:30. Do that and you’ll see the magic that will happen that day. You’ll be more productive. You’ll be happy. And believe you me, once you start this and see the result, overtime it becomes an addiction. That’s the addiction I want to see in our children; work out in the morning, eat well, read their books and so on. These are the things I want.

Does what you do also touch on the environment? Are there aspects that touch on the need to care for the environment?

Yes, of course. Another one is the environment. We want to teach them how to take care of the environment. There are certain things we do that are not good for our environment. Erosion is one of the biggest problems we have in Anambra State. And we are contributing to it every day, one way or the other, without knowing it. So, we want to teach them from this generation so that they know that whatever they do on a daily basis contributes to this erosion. You channel water from your house to outside for it to flow away. Where is it going? It must get somewhere. We want to teach them not to block the waterways. We want to teach them how to live a responsible life.

Outside these, what else are you teaching them at Healthy Living with Nonye Soludo?

Another thing we are teaching them in schools at our Healthy Living Clubs is basic skills. Basic skills are no more in our schools. You go on social media, you see things happening. At a school in Lagos, a child was touching something and he was electrocuting and the students started pouring water on him. They would have all died. So, these are the things we want to teach them. If there is a problem, they know the basic things to do before calling the emergency number. We have the number we call for an ambulance, 112. Before calling that number, they know what to do. We want to teach them to say no to drug abuse, to say no to cultism, to say no to a whole lot of things happening now but that a lot of them don’t know. Mothers are so busy running around for business and neglecting the main job God gave us which is these children. Each time I come around, I always like to see these children. We eat and dance and then I’ll create time to talk with them; call them one by one and listen to them. And sometimes you feel like crying. A lot of them will tell you something and when you ask if they told their mum, they would say that each time they wanted to tell them, their mums would direct them to the house to help with the excuse that they were tired. ‘Go, go, go, we’ll talk tomorrow.’ And tomorrow morning she will leave again. They will end up talking to friends. And when they talk to friends, they may not get the right information. They want you to be like them. We know that our men are so busy but we want them to create time too. But mothers have a role to play. I will meet with a lot of them during this August Meeting so we’ll talk. Some of these children don’t have anybody to talk to them about several things. We’ll be able to talk to them the much we can. We’ll give them sex education; teach them how to take care of themselves, and personal hygiene. Teach them how to cut off processed foods; teach them certain things you must add to your food; something like fibre. Fibre is very important. It mops up all this cholesterol. They are silent killers. But if you don’t add it to your meal, make sure that every day you get some grams of fibre in you. Fibre will make you feel full for longer; it will make you not crave some of this junk. When you eat good food, a whole meal, you won’t crave all these things. Fibre will mop up. It works like a sponge inside you; it will clean you up. It’s a win-win situation. That’s what we want to teach them. We want to catch them young.

Your campaign will affect those producing some of these things you consider as unhealthy for human health. These producers are also creating employment. If everybody stops eating them, don’t you think you’ll be putting a lot of people out of business, thereby creating more unemployment in this country?

It is because we encourage these businesses to send these poisons to the markets. If we say no to a lot of them, they will go back and produce better products. As I said to you, I have over 100 products and none has preservatives. They can do it and reduce the shelf life. You know it is doable but you will reduce the shelf life. If you are putting 10 years, you put something like tinned tomatoes, give it seven years, put it on the shelf and it will be there, not spoiling. Ten, 20 years, it is still like that. It is poison inside that you’re eating. So, when you say no to some of them, they will go back and redo things. A lot of our products in Nigeria can’t enter the UK. So, those are the things we are saying. We must keep them accountable. We must checkmate things. If this is not working, it is not working. People should stop eating it. That’s what I am saying. A simple product will have up to 10 e numbers. E numbers are serious chemicals; they’re serious preservatives to hold it so that they don’t spoil. So, for me, we must continue talking about it so that they wake up.

Have you been able to achieve the targets you set for yourself? What percentage will you give it?

As I said, I have been doing this for years. And everybody around me is talking about healthy living. I don’t think that there’s anybody with me that is not talking about healthy living because it is contagious. I will tell you it’s over 80 per cent I have achieved. In the UK, I give talks about it. And people call me, requesting that I come and lecture them. And when you finish, a lot of people change. They will always call you saying that they’ve changed.

You spoke about the environment. Do you think the state and federal governments are doing enough to preserve our environment and also make our biodiversity stronger?

For the issue of climate change, we need to do more in this country; a whole lot. The type of vehicles on the roads emitting carbon; we really need to do more and that’s why I am taking it upon myself with this club. We want to start teaching them because they don’t know. You can’t give what you don’t have. But when you teach these children, from day one they’ll know. The way they do it in a developed country can’t be the same way because you don’t know. The Federal Government is setting up a whole lot of things. But for me, if you don’t start with these children to teach them about this environment, that all of us can come together and make things change. You don’t always need your vehicle. If you are going somewhere that is about two kilometres away, I don’t see why you need your car to move. In the UK, you don’t always need your vehicles. You walk down. We cycle. Those are things we need to change. We need to start with the children. We need to introduce bicycles back and keep the cars. So, for me, we’ll get there. With these clubs, Anambra will get there.

There was flooding last year in Anambra. This year, another flooding has been predicted. What do you think the Federal Government should do now to mitigate the impact whenever it occurs?

As I said earlier, flooding and gully erosion are twin menaces in this state. They are massive. The government of Anambra State is really preparing heavily for the upcoming one. But that situation is not what the state government alone can handle. So, as we are getting ready for the next one, we are calling on the Federal Government to also help us because it is not something the state can handle on its own. We thank NEMA. They have already brought in some things in preparation for the next one. We have received things from them. That’s where we are. I am assuring you that the state government is really doing a lot in that regard.

Domestic violence has been on the increase recently across the country. As a mother, what do you think should be done by the government and other relevant authorities to address that?

It is really a problem. Every day it is in the news. But we have a law in this state and we are really tackling it. From what you can see on social media, each time it happens, the next minute we are there. The law is really working. And as I said, I will be meeting with our mothers during this August Meeting. I will see all of their heads to talk about it so that they will carry the message home. And we are begging the communities and the churches to help us drive home this message. We will get there. The numbers are coming down. We have a law here and they’ve seen that you can’t do it and get away with it.

The public will always hold the view that projects or programmes like this is one of the avenues through which First Ladies siphon public funds. How is this initiative funded?

Like I said earlier, I didn’t just start because I became the First Lady. It is something I have been running for 10 years now. And it is not going to stop. It is something that has come to stay. From Anambra, we are even moving beyond here. Coming to funding, this initiative is primarily run by people that pay to serve, volunteers; wonderful people that pay to serve. Those are the people running it. We also receive free will donations but not from people that have businesses to handle with the state. We don’t accept from them. But freewill donations strictly from people that don’t have any business with the Anambra government. That’s how it is run. It has nothing to do with the government. (Sunnews)