*Beatrice Ibeneme is Karis Awardee

THE annual benevolence event of the Household of God Church, the G.R.A.C.E programme, will this year be dedicated to the over 200 adopted Chibok schoolgirls who have spent over 220 days in captivity.

Senior Pastor of the church, Rev. Chris Okotie, who on Sunday, December 14, will host the crème de la crème of the Nigerian society at the programme, said, “the connotations of the dedication of this year’s event to the missing girls was to keep the fire of their remembrance and #BringBackOurGirls alive, as all efforts to secure their release continues to be upper-most in our minds”.

To make a resounding signification of this, Okotie said the dresscode for the event would be black, while admonishing attendees to secure rechargeable or battery powered type table lanterns for the significant ‘lights-out’, when attendees will be expected to switch on their lanterns to imply that the search is still on.

The main attraction is that the Karis Award goes to late Mrs. Beat-rice Ibeneme (nee Okebugwu)—the first wom-an to be enlisted in the Nigerian Police with serial number 001.

She receives the award on the heels of another ex-service woman; the 2013 recipient, Air Commodore Habiba Ruth Garba (rtd), who interestingly was also the first female one-star General in the Nigerian Air Force.