Laraba MUREY
Borno State Governor, Babagana Umara Zulum has asked key stakeholders in rebuilding the Insurgency ravaged Northeast to assist in restoring its lost glory.
Zulum made this call on Tuesday, in Abuja during a Consultative Meeting on the North East Stabilisation and Development Master Plan, NESDMP, with Federal Ministries, Departments and Agencies, MDAs, as well as security agencies, organized The North East Development Commission,NEDC
Zulum said, “This is not a political plan. It is a people’s plan. A strategic direction to bring back peace in the North East. I implore everyone involved to help us bring back the lost glory of the north east. The need to have a strong coordination mechanism in the North East cannot be overemphasised. Borno state has already established Agency for Sustainable Development Partnership and Coordination, with the main objective of ensuring coordination of all humanitarian interventions.
“The North East needs all horizontal and vertical coordination to ensure and sustain the coordination mechanism of the region. Without this, we cannot achieve a lot. It is not a bookshelf plan nor an academic paper, but a strategic, trusted master plan for the development of the northeast. The start of this project will not be the end of it, so I charge my fellow governors and leaders to see through the entire process. Good thinking produces great product. Once a plan is good, implementing it becomes a routine that any leader after us can pick up and practise without much stress.”
“Using Borno state as an example, we will make available our 25-year development plan as starting point on our own side. My colleagues will provide that as well. It is important that we are not starting from ground zero. Building on efforts already on ground, we will ensure that we are not just making plans that don’t talk with one another. We will make plans, we will review plans and integrate plans all targeted towards achieving a common purpose governed by good leadership and commitment to finish whatever we start. he said, “
Earlier in her remarks, Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development Sadiya Umar Farouq, said,“It is important to note that our strategic focus at the Ministry now is the provision of coordinated sustainable humanitarian action centred on the global best principle, the ‘Triple Nexus’ approach. This is anchored in a home-grown National Humanitarian-Development-Peace framework developed through a consultative process aimed at reducing vulnerabilities to support and promote peace and stability in Nigeria.
“We are also pushing for the principles of localisation through institutional strengthening and capacity building of local stakeholders including affected communities, civil societies, non-governmental organisation and of course national government. This is guided by the National localization framework developed and validated, which is focused on making all humanitarian interventions as local as possible.”
Also speaking, NEDC Board Chairman, Maj-Gen. Paul Tarfa (rtd),
said, “The Regional Master Plan will come up with a proposed Financing Strategy. However, due to present economic realities, the burden of implementing the Master Pian will be huge. The enormity and cost of rebuilding the North-East is high, hence all Stakeholders, both in the public and private sectors, need to garner resources to achieve that. Therefore, it is imperative that some critical and timely steps are taken in this direction. I wish to recommend to the Honourable Minister of Humanitarian Affairs to consider the following initiatives to address the funding challenges:
Further legislation to improve funding for the Region Convening of a donor/funding conference for the North-East Region. “
In attendance are, minister of Communications and Digital Economy Professor Isa Pantami, Chief of Defence Staff General Lucky Irabor, Inspector General of Police Baba Usman Alkali and National Security Adviser Major-General Babagana Monguno(retd), among several stakeholders.
